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.