Fort Pierce, up a bit of East Coast and Disney World

Our day began with a chilly breakfast at Fort Pierce, and got to enjoy this view.

It was a really nice start of our morning, and it just got better from there. We went to an area where there was a channel and got to see all the people out there enjoying fishing, and actually catching some fish.

And also got to enjoy several Dolphins enjoying their morning also.

This was our first sighting. What is it about Dolphins that just adds a bonus to your day?

And did you know that the pelican is Anthony's favorite bird? So we had to get his picture with some.

We have noticed that when they are flying that sometimes their heads are tucked back and sometimes stretched out. We were wondering if it has something to do with them flying into or against the wind.

We were travelling north along A1A and saw

And we stopped and walked to the beach and saw

Pretty cool, huh?

We stopped at several beaches along the way and saw surfers all along. Surf's up in Cocoa Beach at the end of I Dream Of Jennie Lane also.

About at Cocoa Beach I start talking about Downtown Disney, and Anthony asked, well, do you want to go to Disney or Daytona Beach, and I said why can't we do both, so we start heading west. We made it in time to catch a bus to the Polynesian and got to watch the fireworks.

And last but not least:

We spent the night in Clermont and woke up this morning and decided to head home. If we were waiting for it to get warm in Chattanooga, I think we would be waiting for awhile. So that's what we are doing now, heading north to home.

It's been a great trip, and are so thankful that we got to experience a bit of warmth during the normally cold months of January and February. That was our ultimate goal, and everything else was just a bonus.

Naples and Sanibel

I love this picture of our van parked on Sanibel, so I wanted to post it first.

After we left Key West we went back to Naples for three more nights. We just liked Naples a lot because it is so clean and was entertaining, and the beach is very nice. We made it back on Sunday night in time to catch a sunset, along with a couple of others who were enjoying the last of their weekend.

This was the most crowded we had seen this beach since we had been here.

We enjoyed getting to see the many activities that are enjoyed by the natives and Snowbirds, like 50 and over softball and 65 and over 4.0 tennis.

These fellas, in spite of their knee braces and aches and pains, could still move pretty well.

I was reading in Whole Foods one day, Facetiming mom and dad and recharging our electronics when Anthony came in from his riding his bike and said that there is a touring bike parked outside of Whole Foods that he recognized.

Anthony knows only one person that owns a Seven bicycle and that is his Adventure Cycling instructor from January 2013 when he took a class in Clermont, FL. So he went hunting for him in the store and found them beside the food bar. What a small world. So I got to meet him and his wife who are touring from Fort Myers to Key West. They are from Virginia. What a hoot.

We also got to eat at a nice local place called Steamers. We thought we would beat the crowd when we went at 4:30, but still had to wait for a table. Anthony ate his first calamari and I had Tuna. Both were good and we both enjoyed our meal here.

I have always heard good things about Sanibel Island so we decided to see it on our way north. 

There was so much traffic on the causeway going to the island so we took the first opportunity to park our van and take off on our bikes. And from what we saw, we were lucky we did. There was quite a bit of traffic on most of the island, but there are 25 miles of bike trails and we got to see everything pretty easily. The sign at the visitors center greets us with "please wipe snow off shoes before entering." Lol. Sanibel is known for all the seashells that are on its beaches and many people were doing "The Sanibel Stoop" bending over to scoop up as many shells as they wanted.

Is this some sort of tentacle?

And also headed toward Captiva.

As you can see, beautiful beaches, and not too much commercialism. Just a nice relaxing place to be.

We rode a total of 31 miles today so it was time to get back to the van.

And when we got back, our van was a lot closer to the water than when we left. We had forgotten about the tide. Whoops.

We are glad we got back when we did, or our first swim in the ocean may have been to retrieve our transportation.

Key West

Well, our southernmost destination, of course, was accomplished on Saturday with our arrival at Key West.

We were told that when we found a parking space, to just plan on just staying there because you may not be able to find another one, so that's what we did. We found a place on Truman Street and took off on our bikes and headed down Duval Street and to Fort Zachery Taylor State Park.

There just happened to be some civil war reenactors there and a celebration of civil war heritage days. People had set up tents in the middle of the fort and had all kinds of info for anyone lucky enough to be there to listen.

We also had a nice view of the ocean and surroundings.

That big tall condo looking thing behind and to the right of the flag ^ is actually this:

No trip to The Keys would be complete without a visit to see Earnest Hemingway's house:

And a trip down Duval Street:

We saw where Hemingway supposed to have hung out, Sloppy Joe's.

Now this was kind of fun, because when we told Anthony's brother, Ricky, where we were going, he said we needed to call him so he and Pam could try to see us on the web camera that is in front of Sloppy Joe's, so we did, and here we are. They were able to take a picture of their computer screen and text it to us. Ricky and Pam were our remote tour guides while we were here because they had recently visited.

And as we were strolling through Mallory Square they were able to see us there also, only we didn't know there were cameras there until we got this text: (and the big bird was a bird you could put on your shoulder and get a picture of it, that was where the webcam was set up in front of Sloppy Joe's.) 

But we were able to see a really nice sunset at Mallory Square, but it was difficult to get a shot with everyone gathered for the sunset and street performers. 

We also saw Jimmy Buffet's restaurant, but chose to eat at the Hard Rock Cafe. I know, a chain restaurant, but we ate there anyway.

We decided to just stay and sleep where we were parked but had lots of traffic noise on that busy street.  We woke up about 6:15 and headed out to the southernmost point in the continental USA.

And also got to see this.

We about had the streets to ourselves Sunday morning, so we took advantage and rode around some more. One of the things that is unique about here that I don't think I have seen anywhere else are the roosters and few chickens roaming around town. And amazingly enough, didn't see any of them squished in the road. We were told we needed to follow the chickens for the free eggs, but then someone said they probably roost in trees, so we decided not to do that.

Gives a whole new meaning to free range when they are pecking around the street, people's front porches and in the CVS parking lot, ha!!

Other pics I took that I thought were interesting were:

We also stopped by the Key Deer Wildlife Refuge to see the Key Deer.

But wouldn't you know it?  We didn't see any. Just our luck.

We liked Naples so much that we decided to head back for a few days and hopefully explore more of the area before heading east to the coast and then head north.