Western Caribbean Day 1: Fort Myers & Marco Island

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Arrival

We flew into Orlando with no issue on a 6:45AM flight on Southwest, on time as usual. Columbus is still freezing cold, ice and snow abundant but we were disappointed when the Captain announced that Orlando was two degrees colder than Columbus’ 34 degrees at departure time. Fortunately things warmed up. In Lakeland we decided to go the back roads rather than shoot over on I-4 to I-75 in Brandon. This meant we were principally on US17 through Polk, Hardee and DeSoto counties, arguably Florida’s backcountry where not much happens other than what people identify as Florida’s main industry. We saw many orange groves with trees sagging with ripe orange fruit and were shaken about the road in our little Mitsubishi Eclipse convertible by semi-trucks full of the same. This back way turned out to be faster than the interstate most likely as even though speed limits are limited to 55 MPH most of the way, we were pushing speed closer to 70 MPH and the route is much more direct. We did see some more unusual things which we unfortunately did not photograph as we were in a rush to meet Nate in Fort Myers. This included stockyard in Arcadia which is apparently has a large bovine industry which seemed to once have been larger as there were many abandoned facilities. In southern Polk County there was also numerous trash processing facilities it seemed with the largest flocks of buzzards we have ever seen, they were very ominous.

Lunch at Gulf Coast Town Center

We arrived in Fort Myers around noon and Nate had grown twice in bulk since the last time we saw him in Las Vegas. We went to Gulf Coast Town Center which was a significant disappointment and which was not doing very well, tenants were closing overnight in the last few weeks and a lot of the other ones were following suit according to Nate. To further it, the center is too large and is a confusing mess, one of those projects that people all too often compare to Easton but is a devoid of any intelligent design or attention to detail.

Marco Island

We made it to Marco Island around 3PM and checked into the Hilton Marco Island, owned by our partners, same as Easton Hilton but which was considerably more disappointing. The staff was friendly enough but it is still a resort so things are a bit slower and the physical plant is in very poor condition considering a renovation was effectuated only two years ago. The rack rate was by no means cheap either at $350. Marco Island is of course in Collier County and is Naples’ southerly neighbor which translates to beautiful homes and stately drives. Like the rest of Florida the grayhairs are omnipresent.

We did not get into the water as it was still a cool 75 degrees and the Gulf water still frigid but we had a nice stroll on the beach which had more shells than we have seen on any beach. It is not really a beach in the traditional sense but more a great beach for the grayhairs who like to stroll and pick the shells. We debated whether or not the shells were shipped in by the municipality as is done on many beaches but we found enough live ones that we gave the benefit of doubt to their nativity.

We met Captain Brien and his family and had a great meal at their place, great décor and our first hypnotist show. If you have never gone to a hypnotist show at a comedy club, I think you are missing out, although Jennifer did not think it was as funny as I did. This guy had these people doing some really silly things, you could tell right off the bat who was going to be the best and they delivered. Everything from having them rap in Chinese to having them smell each other all over because the other person just smelled so good and then a couple minutes later they just stank so badly. This type of place, minus the Marco Island prices is a slam dunk in Hampton.

Hilton Marco Island

Well, hate to do it, but have to. We got back to our room late and right when we got off the elevator on the 10th floor there was just the most god awful smell of sewage. I thought maybe one of the rooms near the elevator had dropped a big dookie, but it just seemed to get worse. The rooms tower already has a bit of a smell to it and the rooms worse, but this was really bad. They sent an Engineer or Security guy up who was the nicest guy, Jim or John I think, who almost passed out from the smell when I answered the door. We were so tired we debated staying before he got there but his words were "there is no way you can sleep in this," so we complied and were relocated to a suite.

The suite wasn't that nice either but at least it didn't smell like a latrine. We never found out what the issue was. As Captain Brien said, this place is overpriced and I would probably not even pay half what I paid to stay there. The common areas are okay but the rooms are just too unpleasant, shit smell or not.

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Photos

Beach
The Suite had a much better view. And much cleaner air.

We're Off!
And not too early!

Beach from Marco Island Hilton
Lots and lots of shells, nice to look at, too cold to get into.

Collier Blvd, Marco Island
We ran down this bad boy an hour earlier, really a pleasant place to run!

Eclipse Drop Top
Cruisin' on Collier Boulevard with all da grayhairs yo!