Sunday, February 24-Monday, February 25, 2013

Sunday, February 24, 2013

This is my daughter-in-law, Corinne’s birthday. Since she spent some time with us earlier in the month we have already celebrated her special day with her.

We went back to Hope Lutheran Church today and it was our 8^th visit there. They recently had a golf outing event that raised $16,343.00 for their Learning Center.

Once we got back to our condo, we stayed in for the rest of the day. I had gotten behind in writing posts for our blog, so was able to spend time getting it current.

 Our thoughts are beginning to turn back north now since we will be checking out of this home away from home on Thursday. We are not sure if we are going to be able to deal with cold temperatures again.

Monday, February 25, 2013

We spent some time at Delanor-Wiggins Pass State Park today. This is our favorite beach and we just can’t seem to get enough time there.  It most likely is our last time at the beach here in southwest Florida for this year.

There were a lot of people there today. As we were leaving, there were cars lined up at the entrance gate. I am almost positive that they were not allowed to come in until someone went out.

We had our highest temperature today since we have been here. It was 89° at 1:00 p.m. The water temperature at the park was 72° and I noted that the air temperature in Dunkirk was 34°. Wow—what a difference! But, it is going to be cooling down later this week so it might be easier for us to leave.

I attended a follow-up workshop at the club for a session on writing our memoirs. We all shared a bit of the stories we have started. I read parts of my Pennington family story and I was greatly surprised how well it was received and by the positive comments and suggestions that were made. Everyone had wonderful stories and the class agreed that everybody has a story that they should write down and preserve for their children and grandchildren.

Saturday, February 23, 2013

Today we drove to Sarasota so that we could attend the opening game for the Baltimore Orioles spring training season. 

 The team moved their operations here in 2010. Ed Smith Stadium is extremely fan friendly. It doesn’t appear to me to be any larger than the Baysox Stadium in Bowie, but it sure was a lot warmer here!

The Minnesota Twins were the visiting team. It was fun during the opening ceremonies when a weather report was given. It was announced that the current temperature in Baltimore was 34°, 26° in Minnesota and 82° in Sarasota. There was a rousing cheer from the fans.

I attempted to keep score, but gave up in the 6^th inning when both teams changed 5 players each. I only had 10 lines for each team on my scorecard.

 I was glad to see that the first string players started the game. Brian Roberts is back and I sure hope he stays healthy this season. Matt Wieters got a double for his first hit of this year.

The score was tied 3-3 until Trayvon Robinson hit a 2 run home run in the 8^th inning and the O’s won 5-3.

 

Of course we took time to stop on our way in and out of town to look for some geocaches. My favorite was placed on an old army tank at a VFW post. The cache owner reminded us to take a moment to remember and give thanks to those brave individuals that made the ultimate sacrifice in the service of our country.

We found another one along a railroad among a stack of old rails and ties.

We had thought we would like to eat a nice dinner out at a restaurant tonight, but it seems like all of Bonita Springs had the same idea. Every place had people waiting outside. We decided that we were too hungry to wait, so we stopped in at our local grocery store and picked up some food that we could eat at home. Besides, both of us were just about melted from sitting in the sun at the game and we wanted to clean up and laze around for the remainder of the evening.

Friday, February 22, 2013

Today was the 20^th birthday of our niece, Alyson. She has always liked chocolate. So, in honor of her we ate chocolate chip pancakes on our lanai this morning. We thought it was appropriate since she had spent a week here in Bonita Springs with us in January. We reminded her that she told us she would not be able to make any more foolish teenage decisions---like eating ice cream for dinner as she did while she was with us. As I recall it was a 2-1 vote whether to do it or wait for a normal dinner.

 

After breakfast, we discussed what we might want to do today. Both of us felt like we did not want to go to the pool or the beach--such tough choices. We agreed that we we'd rather look for some more geocaches because it is more fun for us in this warm weather than it is in the cold weather at home. So we made a plan and headed out.

We met three geocachers in a park who were not able to solve the first stage of a two part cache. It required us to find the Florida State Tree--but there was more than one in the park. We put our heads together and Cordell made a quick find. I think they were impressed.

Later, we found 2 caches at the same site. Cordell thought he had found it and I knew I had found it and we each thought the other was crazy! Turns out that someone could not find the cache and reported it missing. So the cache owner asked someone else to replace it for him.

 It seems to us that the colors of the sky and clouds are more vivid here and wonder if that is because there is less smog here.

 

While we were out, we saw a partial rainbow, but there never was any rain where we were. I sure wish I could have found that pot of gold and then we would extend our stay here for a couple of more months.

Thursday, February 21, 2013

We drove to Fort Myers today to tour the historical section. There is a series of geocaches there that require reading and noting specific details. My history classes were never this interesting. However, I understand that some schools are now using geocaching for some of their teaching.

When we arrived at the old Army Post site, I immediately spied a place that I was just certain was the cache and was disappointed when I touched it that it didn't come off. A man observed what I did and he asked me if I was geocaching and then told me that his son is very involved in this activity and so he knew a bit about caching.

We noticed a “No Loitering” sign next to a bench. I couldn’t decide if sitting and resting on that bench would be considered loitering. Maybe sitting would be acceptable, but not napping?

When we visited the site of an old Pullman railroad car on the grounds of the Southwest Florida Museum of History, the ibises seemed to be accustomed to people and they paid no attention to us.

 

There were a lot of flowers blooming in town. Hard to believe it is nearly the end of February!

 I especially liked the front of City Hall.

We have watched the gasoline prices steadily climb to almost $4.00 per gallon. When Cordell saw a station that was selling it for $3.75 a gallon he decided to fill our tank. There were 20 pumps at the station and everyone single one was being used. After a short wait, we were able to pull up to a pump, but as soon as Cordell inserted the hose into our gas tank, we were so disappointed that the entire station has just run completely out of gas. This was at mid-afternoon and I could only imagine how much more gas that station would have been able to sell.

At one of the caches outside of the town proper, we saw a stork hanging around. Southwest Florida is certainly the place to be for seeing many different kinds of birds and seeing them often.