Well I was not going to continue updating this past week, but some of you and "You" know who you are have been reqesting daily updates. So to keep anyone interested in our whereabouts and what we have been doing, here it is.
Sunday November 4th:
Today we went with Mel and Doug for breakfast at the Oasis, where Mel works down here. Once we got back to their house we had to find a bike shop that was open on a sunday, because yesterday Joe had gotten a flat when we were out riding on Sanibel and also had to replace the tire, not just the tube. We had a spare tire with us that we had bought back in Pennsylvania. Well unfortunately it had a twist in it and did not sit right on the rim. So the only bike shop we were able to find open on Sunday was back out on Sanibel. So we drove out there and bought another new tire. Then we were back in business. We drove out to do a short ride over in Lehigh Acres, which is a town near Ft. Myers. Our total miles today was only 11.52 wimpy miles.
Monday November 5th:
Well today was supposed to be a good day. Actually it would have been if the seas had not been rough. Last year when we were down here with Jake, we had gone out on a fishing boat for the day, where they take you 18 miles out and you fish for about 3 hours. Last year we had caught alot of fish and Jake had even won cash for catching the biggest fish. Well that was not to be today. As soon as we started out, both Joe and I realized it was much rougher than it had been last year. We had both taken dramamine medicine before leaving, but unfortunately, it did not work for us. Needless to say it was a looonnngg day on the seas - and - we only caught 5 stinkin' fish. Not sure if we will do that again. We had told Mel and Doug that we would bring our catch home for supper for all of us. We did, along with a pound of salmon we bought at the grocery store on the way home.
Tuesday November 6th
Last week when we had stayed at the Kona Kai on Sanibel we decided to make a reservation to come back out for an overnight tonight. We were lucky to be able to check-in when we got out here around 10. We parked the mini-van and biked to the beach where we hung out for the afternoon. We biked to The Island Cow for supper, a neat little restaurant on the island - they serve "Frickles" - fried pickles. We did not get them, but we have other times we have gone there. There not bad, but they give you way to many. When we left here it was dark - we biked back to the Kona Kai and dropped our bikes off. On Sanibel you can not ride your bikes after dark unless you have a light on them. Later we walked to a couple of the shops nearby.
Wednesday November 7th
This morning we biked down to Captiva for breakfast at our favorite restaurant R.C. Otters - Do you think we like to eat? There is a small bridge that takes you across from Sanibel to Captiva. Captiva is very small with many large expensive homes on it. There is a place right after the bridge called 'Tween Waters Inn, there is a webcam there that we sometimes will tune into from home on snowy days. It looks right on to the beach and you can see the palm trees waving in the breeze. So we got the cell phone out and called Jake. We waved to him and he could see us standing there waving away. So that was exciting for us - and I am sure for him.
Well as far as updates that is all for now. I don't think you are going to get anymore until we return home. Both Joe and I are really ready to go home. We are actually looking forward to going back to work. This island life is rough!
When we get home and settled, I will update this blog with a recap of our trip, I have alot of thoughts and information that I want to take the time to share. I will also have time to post more pictures
So stay tuned..............................................
A few of you have emailed us and asked if we were going to keeping updating our website with our vacation adventures. I was not going to but then decided that we would better remember what we have done if I did update. So this is what we have been up to:
Monday: October 29th
Since we arrived yesterday in Ft. Myers we got up monday morning and did what we had been doing for the last 6 weeks every day - we got into our bike clothes and hopped on our bikes. We thought that the ride from Mel and Dougs was 15 miles to Sanibel. However, we were a little off as it turned out to be 26. We had made a few side stops and by the time we arrived out on Sanibel we had ridden 36 miles. We had planned on riding back but once we got out here it was after 2:00 and the headwind going back would have been really strong. So we got a motel room out on Sanibel and spent the night. We hung out at the beaches, ate and biked around the island. We added another 9 miles for the day.
Tuesday: October 30th
We got up fairly early and biked to a local restaurant that we like on Sanibel. We then went back to the beaches and just goofed off until around 12:30 when we headed back off the island for the ride back to Ft. Myers. We stopped at Sun Harvest - an big orange juice place - on the way back and had lunch at Ruby Tuesday's! As we were biking across the Sanibel Bridge the wind was fairly strong, I looked over to my right and at shoulder level I was biking along with a pelican flying with me. That was pretty cool. Once we got back we realized that if we wanted to continue to go other places we really needed to get a rental car. So I called a few places and reserved one to pick up Wednesday morning. Total miles ridden today 38.79
Wednesday: October 31st Halloween
Our rental car was ready for 8 am. We biked down to the rental place about 6 miles. We put the bikes in the mini van and we now had motorized wheels. The wind was really strong today and more than we wanted to fight riding. So we drove down to Ft. Myers Beach and went to Lover's Key State Park. The walk on the beach and back to the parking is probably around 4 miles. We collected some shells. We wanted to avoid going back to Mel and Dougs until later in the evening because the neighborhood is BIG on halloween and we did not want to have to buy any candy. So we went to Walmart and took our memory cards from our cameras and had all our pictures put on CD. We have about 1000 pictures. What a slideshow!
Thursday: November 1st
Yesterday when we got the mini van we went to a bike shop to find out about shipping our bikes home next week. They had a map of bike routes. So we decided to ride one of them today. We found the start of the trail and ended up doing a 60.75 mile loop. We stopped in Ft. Myers Beach and had lunch and then found our way back to where we had parked.
Friday: November 2nd
No biking today!! How bizarre. Instead, we drove down to check out Marco Island. We were not very impressed, although it is a very ritzy area with large homes. We arrived back in the afternoon to await Melanie and Doug's arrival. We were looking forward to seeing them and visiting. They arrived about 5:00, we had supper ready for them - spaghetti, salad and bread. We stayed up until 11-ish talking about our trip. It is the first time we have really had anyone ask us questions about our adventure and it was fun to talk about it.
Saturday: November 3rd.
We have driven out to Sanibel and are going to bike down to Captiva, hang out at the beach and probably have lunch. It is fun riding on Sanibel and Captiva because it is a very biking friendly place. Sanibel has bike paths that cover the whole island and when you get to a road crossing cars have to stop and they actually do! It is fun to ride in a familar area too.