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our first beach Bowman's beach Day 5 Blog – May 17, 2019 – Naples to St. Petersburg, FL – 239 miles
After yesterday’s rainy weather, the bright, sunny morning got us ready to start our day of beachy adventures. Before we left the hotel, Susan and Claire sent Pam to go get something from the van as they were packing the cold stuff. Well, no one realized until Pam was out there and didn’t come back that she was locked out of the hotel and didn’t have her phone. You see, unless the hotel gives us 3 room keys (which isn’t often), Claire and Susan are the key holders and they don’t share with Pam (it’s an older sisters power thing). Well, needless to say, Pam got some extra steps she wasn’t planning having to walk all the way around the hotel to get back in.
Our main goal today was to visit a bunch of beaches and the first beach on the agenda was Bonita Beach. Not only was the beach as beautiful as its name, but the immaculate homes that lined the road with pristine landscaping made it “muy bonita”!
We drove on the beach roads and passed through numerous beaches
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we went down to this side that wasn't as crowded on the way to our next stop. The sun was shining, the drive was beautiful, then all of a sudden Pam had to weave through road construction as we made our way to our second big stop at Sanibel Island. Claire had been there before, but Susan and Pam had both been told by friends to make sure to go to Sanibel Island, because it had the prettiest beaches and they were full of sea shells. That Sun Pass we bought the other day came in handy zipping us quickly through the traffic and onto the island. On the island we headed in search of Bowman’s Beach. A short walk from the parking area and we found ourselves on a beach that was truly covered with nothing but shells. Although we each left with a handful of small sea shells, there were no large shells to be found anywhere that we saw. The sandy shore was short and dropped off rather quickly a few feet in, but the water was a gorgeous blue-green color and still had the gentle Gulf waves. We were disappointed that the sand was not white. To get our daily dose of Vitamin D, we stayed
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unknown glob monster on the beach. It was breathing. It's Alive!!!! there for a good while sunning on the beach or in the shallow part of the water. With the temps in the 90s before noon, even the ocean breeze wasn’t enough to keep us cool and eventually, we had to go get cooled off.
On the causeway going off the island, we pulled off and parked in the shade for lunch. Wow, what a view all 4 of us had for lunch, even Scarlett. With the doors open we all just relaxed in the shade . . . that is until a dreaded pair of love bugs appeared on the windshield in front of Pam. Oh, no!!! Not the love bugs again. We watched for more, but it seemed they were the only pair. Then about 10 minutes later, another pair joined them on Susan’s side. We figured there would be more so we decided to run an experiment. Susan sprayed Windex on the love bugs on her side; we would use the one on Pam’s side as the control group – the scientists that we are . . . the sprayed bugs first separated and then they slowly stopped moving. But then a weird thing occurred, it seems
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Susan searching for shells the ammonia from the spray started attracting other love bugs and they would fly in and land in the Windex only to meet their demise. The control group was still going strong and doing what they do most of the day long with each other. Pam said, “Geez . . . get a room, would you!!!” Later on our drive to the next beach, we kept finding love bugs in the van. Maybe they took Pam seriously and thought the van was their room.
At Fort Myers, we saw Thomas Eidson’s house and made pictures of a giant ice cream cone building and took in some more large beach homes. The roads were all lined with palm trees and it looked just like a page out of a magazine. Another love bug landed on Pam’s arm and 2 more crawled up Susan’s window and she had to let them out . . . are they haunting us for our experimenting?
Stopping at a Shell station for a pit stop, we were surprised to see a Bitcoin ATM . . . what???? We continued on mostly interstate until we arrived in St. Petersburg/Clearwater at our hotel. We were ready
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tons and tons of shells to get to our last beach for the day and have supper, so off we went to Clearwater Beach. The first place we intended to eat was closed off for a special event going on, so we were turned away. Then we found a new place where we all shared a meal of crab legs, appetizers, and a piece of key lime pie (Pam finally got some key lime pie)! While there, a guy started a challenge to eat one of the restaurants monster burgers in 1 hour. When they say monster burger, they mean it . . . it was 5 lbs of food, the size of a dinner plate, and as thick as a pillow. We have no idea how he even got it in his mouth; it was huge! We were there less than 30 mins of his time, but he had already eaten almost ¾ of it. We’re not sure how he was doing it, but hopefully he won the challenge.
Leaving the restaurant, we saw the sun going down, so we quickly rushed to the beach to snap some pictures and walk in the fine, white sand of Clearwater Beach. Finally, we saw the
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Our shadow picture snow-white sand of the Gulf. It was absolutely gorgeous. Wish you could have been there. Last, but not least, on the way back to the hotel, we witnessed a strange sight as we passed by Clearwater High School football stadium where they were playing a football game and the score was 13-14. When did they change football season to Spring????
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