Friday, March 28th - Sanibel Island all day!

It must be difficult to accurately predict the weather here or else our app is not a particularly good one. Very often, we have found that forecasted rain does not materialize. That was pleasantly the case today. We had an 80% chance of rain by 2:00 p.m. So, we decided to make hay while the Florida sun shines. It turned out to be a fabulous day and one that I will remember all year long. It couldn’t have been much better for us.

 

 

 

We loaded up our bicycles and headed back to Sanibel Island. It is approximately the same size as Manhattan Island, NY - 7 miles by 2 miles. However, Sanibel has 6,000 residents and Manhattan has that many in one building. This is a very beautiful place and I wonder if anyone ever tires of it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It seemed that we had good timing because when we arrived at the parking lot at 10:00 a.m., the empty parking spaces were filling up quickly. We chose the lot next to the beach at the lighthouse. We unloaded our bikes and took off for a geocaching excursion which took us to parts of the island we hadn’t seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many of the residents have personalized their mailboxes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are accustomed to seeing signs warning motorists to watch for panthers and bears--also signs telling us not to feed the alligators. But it is only on Sanibel that I have seen signs cautioning us about the gopher tortoise. I wonder how long it would take for one to actually cross a road!

 

 

We saw several properties for sale, but one in particular caught my eye. I sent a photo of it to my son, Andy, and told him if he wanted to invest in it, we would be happy to take care of it for him during the winter months

 

 

 

 

One geocache was placed on a red mangrove root at the site of a small pier along a canal at a location we would never have otherwise seen. People evidently fish here because there is a fish cleaning station set up on one end of the boardwalk. I found it very peaceful and restful to sit there under a canopy of trees while tucked back off the road and the busy bicycle trail.

 

 

At midday, we rode back to the parking lot, retrieved our picnic supplies and ate our lunch at a table placed in the nearby woods.

 

 

People were now idling their cars in the full parking lot while waiting for someone to leave. I felt sorry to disappoint those who asked us if we were leaving when we walked to and from our car.

 

By this time, our cell phone batteries were low, so we left them charging in our car and spent a couple of hours on the beach recharging our batteries, too.

 

 

 

 

 

After spending about 2 hours on the beach, we were sufficiently rested so we took off on our bikes for more geocaching. The last cache we found was named Welcome to Paradise and was located on undeveloped land near the causeway bridge.

 

 

 

If Adam and Eve had lived in this paradise, they would have had no trouble covering their naked bodies. We went through some leaves that stuck to our shoes and socks so badly that we couldn't even remove them. We threw our socks away. We have never seen leaves like these and I haven’t found out what they are.

 

 

We were having such a good time and I never wanted to give up this day. Suddenly, we noticed that our parking meter was going to expire in about 15 minutes. I knew that I could never bike fast enough to reach the parking lot that quickly. So, Cordell jumped on his bike and left me in the dust, or I should say the sand, while he raced his bike back to the parking lot. I followed at a relaxing pace which was just about all the pedal power I had left in me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I so wanted to stay and see the sun set, but it wasn’t going to happen until 7:45 p.m. Some clouds had started to gather and we weren’t sure if there would be anything to see. We were hot, sweaty, tired and thirsty, so we decided to call it a day came on back to the condo.