‘Secret Tampa Bay’ Author Hosts Book Signing At Brewery

SARASOTA, FL — After falling in love with “strange and unusual travel” about five years ago, Tampa-based author Joshua Ginsberg decided to share some of his favorite local destinations in a regional guidebook. He highlighted nearly 100 lesser-known attractions and historic sites in his book “Secret Tampa Bay,” which he’ll sell and sign at Big Top Brewing Co. on Sunday from noon to 2 p.m.

Ginsberg adopted his offbeat approach to local travel when he and his wife were still living in Chicago. After receiving news that one of his closest childhood friends died suddenly, he began thinking about all the plans they’d made together and were never able to do.

“It was a shock to me and made me realize that if there's things you're not doing, every plan, in a sense, is a prayer that you'll have the time to see it through,” he said.

Not long after this, he and his wife decided to move to Tampa. With six months left in the Windy City, the couple decided to “make an effort in ways we never had before to learn, see, experience everything we could that was uniquely Chicago before we left,” Ginsberg said. This ranged from finding the best place for chicken vesuvio — a Chicago favorite — to going to the top of Willis Tower to riding the Ferris wheel at Navy Pier.

They decided to take the same approach to their new home once they moved to Florida.

“When we moved here to Tampa, we realized that not only is it a cool way to say goodbye to a place, but a good way to get to know a place, too,” he said.

Ginsberg began creating “adventure lists” for the Tampa Bay area. The lists ranged from “strange and unusual things” to beaches and shopping destinations, he said.

It was a trip to visit family in his hometown of Philadelphia that got him thinking about compiling all of these spots in a book.

“I hadn’t been back (to Philadelphia) since I discovered this new approach to seeing the world around me,” he said.

Before his visit, he picked up a copy of “Secret Philadelphia,” which was released by Reedy Press. Reading the book, he learned “about stuff that I grew up next door to that I literally didn’t know about,” he said.

He also realized that, through all of his research and travels, he had the makings of a Tampa Bay area guidebook.

“When I saw they didn’t have a ‘Secret Tampa Bay,’ I wrote to (Reedy Press) and told them I thought I had inadvertently written it, and we went from there,” he said.

The book came out Sept. 1. At first, Ginsberg was concerned about releasing it in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, but then he realized the timing couldn’t have been better. Many people aren’t traveling by plane because of COVID-19 and are staying closer to home.

“Sometimes you think fate is throwing you under the bus, and it turns out it’s really doing you a favor,” he said. “Here in Florida, things are open enough that people are looking for things to do that aren't their living room or kitchen. But they're not doing any air travel — they’re traveling by car and doing really local travel.”

And many of the destinations included in “Secret Tampa Bay” are outdoors, allowing for social distancing, he said. “We live in a place where so much of these strange and wondrous and unusual activities are outdoors. And when you visit a lot of the places in the book, don’t worry, you’ll probably be the only one there.”

Most of the locations in his book are about an hour’s drive from Tampa, he added. He goes “as far north as Weeki Wachee for the mermaids, as far south as Sarasota for the Howard Tibbals circus inside the Ringling Museum and as far east as Bartow and Lakeland for the grave of Charlie Smith,” he said.

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Other interesting stops for Sarasota- and Bradenton-area readers include the ruins of Braden Castle at Braden Castle Park, the Marietta Museum of Whimsy and the Sea Hagg antiques store.

Up next for Ginsberg are two additional titles through Reedy Press: “Oldest Tampa Bay” and a scavenger hunt inspired by his original “Secret Tampa Bay” title. The scavenger hunt book will include clues that bring people to nearly 400 attractions and historical sites in the region.

“There are all these weird monuments and artwork and things we whiz past in the course of our life every day that we don’t think about or examine,” he said, adding that he hopes his books “get people engaged in local history and local activities.”

Learn more about “Secret Tampa Bay” online here.