Boring Vacation Narrative - Day Three

When I last posted, I'd just listened to Darald put his wife down, had a few giggles with Robert, and finally got a little sleep on a bed that was not the floor.

I woke up the next morning and Robert was already up and in the shower. So, I headed out to the family room to visit with Pat. She asked me if we were going to go rent a car. I said we were if Darald was going to be sleeping in every morning. I hadn't planned a vacation to sit in a golf community and do nothing.

When Barb got up, she said she had a set of keys and I should just take her keys and go rent a car. She said that Darald was really worn out from driving down to Florida and she thought he might want to take it easy a day or two.

Typical. He's ruled their roost for so many years that Barb just lets it go. She asked what we were going to do. Of course, I wasn't really sure, because first of all, we didn't have a car rented yet, but I told her some of the things we were hoping to do while we were there. And, I made certain to let both she and Pat know that we weren't trying to keep away from them, that we wanted to do as much together as we could, but if we weren't interested in the same things, than it was far better to have two vehicles so we could split up and do different things and meet up in the evenings.

We headed off back on that cursed Hwy 41 again, for that's where we'd seen the car rental place. I was driving. In this case it wasn't a good plan. You see, my seat in the van had been the very back one, so I didn't get a good view of highway signs and such. So, when had crossed the three lane bridge into Ft. Myers, I'd never noticed that the two left lanes were to go straight south on 41 and the right lane was business. So, I took the business route. *sigh*

It was not so much business as it was a residential area. Absolutely gorgeous with palm tree-lined streets that wound through the single family homes, more in the price range that most of us could afford. And...not a convenience store in sight. And, I was lost. Finally found a small one about ten miles later, and we pulled in, and Robert decided to fill up the gas tank. Boy did he fill the tank. Our van has a huge tank, so he didn't even think about it and really topped off the tank...and the top of his shoe as well. Peeeeyewwww! That made the ride interesting for awhile. I mean, I really like the smell of gasoline in minute amounts, but not a whole car full!

Anyway, it turned out that we weren't too far from getting back on track, but my fear was that we had overshot our location to pick up the rental. But, we finally found it, and rented a neat little Mazda 6. What a cool little sporty car that was! We really were hoping for a convertible, but that just didn't work out. Robert drove the car back and I drove the van since we figured Darald had been letting me drive it, it was better that way.

Back to our little house, and Darald was just getting around. He'd gone down to the swimming pool to check it out. Came back and in his delightful (?) way told us that we three "gals" had nothing to worry about in our swimsuits because there were "big girls" down at the pool. I mentally shook my head.

They had decided while we were gone that we should have lunch over at the clubhouse. We headed over there and looked the place over. It's a very nice setup, and the restaurant was quite nice. The staff was pleasant, and the food was delicious. As we ate, we discussed what we might want to do that afternoon. Now, 'discussed' was pretty one-sided. They asked, "what should we do today?" and then looked over at me hopefully. I threw out a couple of suggestions. I suggested that we figure out where Sanibel Island was and go over there; Sanibel is supposed to be the best place in the area for shelling. They sounded as though they might be interested. I also suggested that we might want to check out Manatee World. It's a boat tour that supposedly has a good reputation for spotting the elusive creatures.

And, I absolutely love manatees.

So, we decided to pile in our various vehicles and head for Sanibel. Darald's last words to us were, "We'll follow you."

Next thing we know, our view of their van is of them turning left into The Shell Factory . And, that was the last we saw of them. Kinda pissed us off. They never *once* made any suggestions as to what they wanted to do, but apparently they had some kind of idea they didn't care to share with us. We headed onward toward Manatee World. But, the exit we were supposed to take was closed. No detour signs were present, and the road was completely blocked. So, we tried to work our way around it with the aid of our trusty map.

But, the map neglected to mention that the road we wanted to take was a one way road - going the opposite way. Hell, there were left turn lanes, and signals. The directions and highway signs said that we were to turn left there, but we were suddenly engulfed in three lanes of traffic, all going *against* us. Yikes! Thank the gods there was a restricted lane we could pull into and get away from that street. Yes, and that street got us even more lost. Argh! It took some doing, but we finally got straightened around and found....

Interstate 75, the dreaded six lane on each side horror we'd heard so much about.

But, we haven't figured out what happened to the other ten lanes.

We only saw a typical interstate highway, with two lanes on each side. There was a whole lot of grumbling in our little car for a bit. We could see instantly how much time we would have saved if we'd have insisted we take the interstate. But, you know how it is...you have to learn to pick your battles in order to win the war.

Wasn't very long until we found our exit to Manatee World.

It was closed for the season. Apparently manatees say bye-bye to the tourists when the water gets to around 82 degrees. No manatees this trip, darn it! Even the gift shop was closed, darn it!

But, all was not lost. We'd seen the sign for a winery we were interested in touring. It was about 11 miles further. So, while we're in the neighborhood...

Eden Winery appealed to me, not because I like wine in mass quantities, but because they had a specialty wine that seemed most unusual. Their Tropical Carambola Starfruit wine is delightful! I'd never heard of wine made from starfruit. Of course not! How often does one see starfruit in the Midwest?

We arrived at the winery pretty late in the day, about 40 minutes before the posted closing time. There were three old dogs lounging on the porch, but they didn't seem too interested in meeting us, so we left them to their naps. There was no tour, in fact, the clerk seemed less than thrilled to see us wander in, so much so, that we hesitantly asked if we should go, or if we might look around a bit. She brusquely waved an arm toward the table which had all the wines set up, and we looked each one over. I pointed out the starfruit wine to Robert. He looked at the clerk and asked her point blank if we could have a taste. She stomped off to the bar, slammed a couple of little sample cups down on the bar and poured a couple of different wines. Then she slammed the wine bottles back in the fridge, and glared at us.

Robert and I are both very 'customer oriented' so we just started talking to her as though she was the customer and we were the clerks. And she thawed out a bit...but only a tiny bit. And relented enough to let us taste a couple more brands of wine which they produced. We decided to get a case of wine.

"You do ship wine, don't you?" I asked, knowing full well what the website had stated. (I made sure of this prior to vacation, just in case)

"Where do you live?"

"Iowa," we replied.

"We don't ship to Iowa. It's against the law."

HUH?

So after a hurried consultation, we decided to purchase only a few bottles and ask Barb and Darald to bring them back with them. We knew that wouldn't go over worth a darn.

So, we made the purchase and went back to the car. Drove down the lane to the gate.

And, the gates were closed. We were locked IN. We drove forward slowly in case the gate was one of those which were motion activated from the inside. Nope.

We turned around and went back to the winery. Just as we got there, a pickup drove by us, the driver frowning, wondering just how we'd gotten in. It was one of the same trucks we'd seen when we were pulling into the winery. But, apparently they thought we'd been chased away and had locked the gates. Anyway, we turned around and followed him. He opened the gates for himself and pulled over to the side of the road. We passed by him and got the heck out of there, and we were just a little creeped out by the experience. I have, in writing about this for all of you, taken the time to write to the winery and ask them about the whole shipping thing and telling them we didn't feel as though it was the most customer friendly place. We'll see if we get any response.

Oh, and we also talked to the girl about manatees, and Sanibel Island while we were there. It's always cool, in my opinion, to get information from folks who actually live in the area. You can find out the neatest places to eat, etc. I'm sure you all know that, though!

But, this girl just wasn't into customer service, I guess. Not only did she give us the impression that she thought we were stupid for being excited about seeing manatees, she also told us that Sanibel Island was nothing to look at and (get this) she'd lived in Florida all her life and had never been there.

So, how does one figure out that Sanibel Island was not worth looking at? I'm still trying to figure that one out!

After we escaped from the winery, we decided we would go check out Sanibel Island to see what it was all about. We wanted to get up before dawn and go watch the sun rise on the beach, and go shelling. But, we wanted to make sure we could find the place, too!

And, off we went on our adventure. We found Sanibel to be a lovely place. It was full of expensive homes, and lots of places for tourists to stay. We found a place to walk along Sanibel and went out on the beach for awhile. Of course, that late in the day all the pretty shells were all gone, but we knew there was hope for the next day.

We went on over to Captiva Island, which is joined to Sanibel by a small causeway. It's a very quaint island. Charming, with many things to look at. We decided we'd try to stay on Captiva the next time we come to Florida. While we were there, we found the boat tour we wanted to go on. This tour took us to a little place called Cabbage Key, which is one of the places Jimmy Buffet said that he wrote "Cheeseburger in Paradise" about. More about that in a future post.

We drove as far west as we could, and then regretfully headed back toward Ft. Myers, knowing we'd be returning the next day.

We headed back to the house, and found out that my cell phone was not working for some reason. They'd tried to call us a couple of times to see if we wanted to meet for dinner, but I hadn't gotten any voice messages. Weird. Phone was doing great for call *outs* but wasn't getting the incoming ones. Have not yet figured out why.

We wound down the day talking about our experiences. After Barb, Darald and Pat went to the Shell Factory, they went to Punta Gorda to look at a petting zoo that the lady at the restaurant had suggested. But, their day was as messed up as ours. They got lost, and when they got to their destination, it was closed, so they ended up just walking along the docks and looking at the boats. What a day!

So I did some knitting while we talked, and admired Pat's impulse purchase. She'd found a "puppy"...a Pug...(of course it's a stuffed dog)...but it 'breathes'. It's cute as can be. They're by a company called Perfect Petzz if you want to see them.

Anyway, we didn't do anything but grab sandwiches and chips at the house. Figured after all the food we'd been inhaling, a quiet night with just sandwiches would be fine.

I do have to mention that it really ticks me off, though that I am able to find Fanta Pineapple soda in the grocery stores in both Las Vegas and Florida, but I can't find it in the Midwest. Maybe I'll have to write another letter. LOL

So, that concludes Day Three of the Florida vacation. Tomorrow's journey will be about our trip back to Sanibel and Captiva Island and our boat trip.

It will soon be my bedtime, so I'll bid you all sweet dreams for now!