Family+Florida=Fun

Bill Blog Post  3-29-2020

This is long overdue as I guess we just got caught up in life here in Costa Rica and did not do a good job of recording what has been happening.  Our time is looking a little different right now so we are going to do some catching up.  Our 40th wedding anniversary fell last May and we wanted to get the whole family together so we had decided that we would do this the first week of November in Florida.  We wanted it to be someplace warm, at a time everyone could get off work, and someplace that everyone could get to pretty easily.  We had decided last spring that Florida would work well and Jane researched until we ended up going with Marcos Island just south of Naples on the Gulf Coast of Florida.  One of my conditions for returning to Del Mar this year was the ability to take this week off during the school year.

We flew out of San Jose since flights to Miami are very reasonable and are less than three hours.   We had what we thought was a great deal on a rental car that would come back to haunt us.  When we got to the counter, costs were added on and when we tried to find another company we could find nothing at a better price.  By this time the people at the counter were quite frustrated with us, and Jane was not very happy.  They suggested we pay extra for the toll pass but we were pretty sure everything was just another way to get more money at this point.  They tried to point out that this was going to be a problem but we were not ready to listen to anything they had to say and took the car without the pass.   We were headed first to Orlando and our directions took us on the toll way.  It turned out that they had no toll booths and the only way you could pay was through the pass or by having something set up ahead of time through your car registration.  We could not do that of course because we only had the rental car.  When we checked the directions avoiding any toll way it was going to take many hours longer.  We had to swallow our pride and return to the rental office and ask them to add on the toll pass.  Not an auspicious beginning but smooth to Orlando after that.  Our itinerary included two nights in Orlando so that we could spend one day at Universal Studios and Harry Potter World!  Part of our reasoning is that was a series that we read aloud (all the way through all the books) to the kids as they were growing up.  I even reread the series so that I could refresh my memory before visiting the theme park.  Brittany, Brynn, Glenn, and Erin all met us at the Air B & B that evening and Daniel would be joining us the next day.  We got a nice early start and made the most of our day at Universal Studios.  We took in most of the Harry Potter features and added on a few of their other well-know attractions like the Incredible Hulk.  It was a really fun day and Daniel even got in early enough to meet us there in the afternoon.  One of our favorites was “Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey” .  We had gone once earlier in the day and then after dark the line got really short so we went on it two times more-one right after the other.  The second time got to me.  I will take a roller coaster anytime over the virtual motion rides.  I was close to losing my stomach contents and am pretty sure if I had opened my eyes at all that last time it would have been all over (literally)!  Butterbeer was fun but a little too sweet unless you got the cold version.

 

 

Keewaydin Island (north of Marcos Island)

The next morning we drove about four hours south to Marcos Island with a very important stop in Sebring, Florida.  It was fun to drive through a city where you see your last name everywhere!  Marcos Island is a heavily developed island with certain pockets of high-rise hotels and condos and then lots of single family homes built on canals leading out to the Gulf.  One of the reasons we chose Marcos Island was the boat access to the Gulf directly from the house and we had decided we would rent a boat for a couple of days and tie it up right at our dock.  The house we rented was huge-two stories with five bedrooms and lots of outdoor space, a pool, a dock on the canal.  It worked great for our group and everyone had their own space as well as a lot of common space as well.  We spent the days enjoying the house and the pool, exploring some of the undeveloped beaches, spending time on some of the main beaches and then boating adventures out to the 10,000 islands wildlife refuge, and the inland passage up to Naples and Keewaydin Island.  Many of the channels get very shallow if you get out of the main marked passage and I was able to run aground the boat one time on the sand.  Fortunately we were not going very fast and we were able to get it off the sand bar and into deeper water.  In our boat travels we were able to see a few dolphins and lots of beautiful water.  This is one of the slowest times of the year in Marcos Island so we often felt like we were almost by ourselves.

 

Picnic in the 10,000 Islands refuge

Our rental boat

We set aside one of the evenings as our official “anniversary celebration” and ordered catered food and enjoyed a wonderful time together.  The house where we stayed also had kayaks and paddleboards so we could explore the canals in the area.  It was just what we hoped for -having everyone together in one place with nothing else to do but spend time with each other!

 

Somebody thought Dome Houses would be a good idea (until the first hurricane)

There were osprey everywhere!

It was also a nice break from the end of the rainy season in Costa Rica.  We flew back to Costa Rica on Saturday and unfortunately left a phone in the car.  We tried for weeks to contact the rental car company by email and by phone and got absolutely no response.  That rental car company turned out to be the cheapest, but not the wisest choice.  We got back to school and were ready to finish off the trimester, after a wonderful, wonderful week with all the kids.  Being all together for a week made the 40th anniversary the best ever!