Saturday, February 2, 2013

Groundhog Day—If Punxsutawney Phil had been in Bonita Springs today, he would have seen his shadow for sure because the sun was shining all day. Six more weeks of the kind of winter weather we have had here will be just fine and dandy, I think.

We left for Sanibel Island at 9:00 a.m. It is about an hour drive for us. This was the second time we have been to the island in less than four weeks. But we like this place so much that we would be content to visit there more often. It is necessary to cross a bridge from the mainland and it costs $6.00 to travel onto the island—no returning toll—much like the Bay Bridge at home.

We stopped at the Visitors Center so Melli could see the famous sign that is there.

We wanted to buy some souvenirs and we knew we had better get them before we hit the beach. I purchased a plastic message in a bottle to mail to my granddaughter. I spilled some of the sand out of it while trying to get the paper out so I could write my message. There was plenty of sand everywhere we looked so I just scooped up what I needed and mailed the bottle.

We grabbed a quick lunch before continuing on to the beach.

 People had told us that Bowman’s Beach was a good place to find seashells, so that’s where we went. It was a longer walk from the parking lot to the beach than some of the other beaches.

It was a perfect beach day—not too hot for sunning. Melli had a great time collecting seashells and she did some swimming. The water temperature is still not warm enough for me to go in above my knees. Besides, we have a heated swimming pool in our condo neighborhood.

We saw a couple of strange sites on the beach. We think this woman was trying to use some type of electronic device.

Two men showed up with metal detectors which they operated in the water. One of them told Melli that they were looking for gold. Melli’s reply was that she didn’t think she would even know what gold looked like!

 

There are cold water outdoor showers at this beach and outside changing rooms. I have seen the same type of showers at other beaches, but not changing rooms like these!

 

Once we had enough sun, we decided to look for some geocaches. Since there was one placed just off this beach, we started there. Another one took us the well known Sanibel Lighthouse.

There was a wedding party on the beach. I don’t know if the ceremony took place there or if they were just taking photos. Apparently this occurs often on this beach.

 

We saw a tree with coconuts.

 

Before we left the island, we just had to stop at Pinocchio’s for some homemade ice cream. I remembered that the servings sizes are extremely generous so I just shared the dish that Cordell ordered and we still were not able to finish it.

 On our drive back to the condo, we saw some clouds in the sky and the view looked like mountains in the background.