It was our final day and the prospect for west coast thunderstorms looked reasonable. Clouds bubbled up very quickly during the morning, and after an hour or so in the pool, we decided that the skies were ripe to pop. Thunderstorms had already fired to our north over Pinellas County, and skies to our west, looking towards the coast, looked good.

Our first storm of the day broke to our west as we picked up supplies from our neighbourhood Walmart, although it didn't produce much lightning and we kept clear of its rain. We ventured further north towards the Little Manatee River State Park, stopping off at the National Weather Service forecast office in Ruskin. Another storm developed overhead as we arrived at the state park, although this cleared promptly, allowing us one last exploration of Florida's natural wilderness.

We hit the road again by mid afternoon, heading inland to follow a decent looking boundary - probably the west coast sea breeze boundary. This was firing storms to our south, and one very large storm over Bradenton dumped 44mm of rain in less than an hour. Spotting that this line was building ever southwards, we dropped further down the peninsula to catch up with storms now south-east of Sarasota. These remained quite distant, however, and as early evening approached, we headed back to base.

Our final few hours of the day were spent at a local steakhouse, enjoying the last of our high calorie diet, albeit feeling sad that we would be leaving the States within 24hrs.

We've had an absolutely fantastic fortnight in the Sunshine State, and have once again been impressed by the Floridian hospitality, the natuaral landscape and, of course, the storms. Florida storms may not produce the cataclysmic supercell storms that most people hammer after in the Great Plains in the springtime, but what they lack in destructive power they more than make up for in frequency and aesthetics. We've pretty much seen it all; frequent lightning, torrential rain, damaging winds, spectacular cloudscapes and even hail. We've proved the importance of following sea breeze and outflow boundaries very closely, if you want to be in the right place at the right time. We are leaving empty handed when it comes to seeing tornadoes/waterspouts, but given the excellent time we've had, we're not complaining.

What makes it a memorable chase experience though, is Florida itself. Tropical vegetation, white sandy beaches and turquoise seas, not to mention some insanely friendly wildlife. Throw in a nice villa and a swimming pool and it has to be the perfect storm chase. We'll definitely be back!