Walking on the Beach!

My day started with me preparing to head to the Everglades with a couple of folks on a half-day tour. I put new wiper blades on the van and gassed it up before heading to the first pick-up (we pick folks up at their hotel or prearranged locations and haul them to the Everglades for an airboat ride on our half day adventure or a full day of fun and adventure on the full day tour).

I arrived at the point of pickup about 10 minutes early, which is normal for me, where I set up my iPhone to play some good music to get us in the mood for the day's journey. Today I selected James Taylor. So I waited. And I waited. I made a phone call to the phone number on the info sheet that Cristina gives me, and no one answered. So I waited again. About 25 minutes after the pickup time passed I received a call from the owner and we discussed the situation and decided to cancel. We never would have made our 10:30am airboat ride anyway. Later I found out that one of our guests had a medical issue at the last minute and they had to cancel. Although it is always nice to get advanced warning on stuff like this so that time and resources are not wasted, it certainly is understandable and it made my time seem unimportant in the scheme of things.

Since I now had some free time on my hands, seeing that 4 hours of my day had just been freed up, I headed home, switched into a pair of zip -off Columbia fishing pants (the kind that the lower legs zip off to make shorts if you so desire), of which I elected to turn into shorts, and took off, camera in hand, for a walk on the beach. You see, our home on Estero Island is right on the Gulf of Mexico, so a walk on the beach starts in my back yard.

It was a little cool but before my 4 mile hike was over I had my shirt off and was soaking in some rays. I had plenty of photo ops today. The "wrack line" was full of good stuff. For those of you who do not know the terminology of beach living, the wrack line is that line of "junk" along a beach that is where the high water mark of high tide washes up all kinds of stuff on the beach. In general its mostly natural things. However, it is also where you will find man trash. You know what I mean by "man trash". Bottles, cans, six-pack plastic thingies, and all kinds of discarded items that man (the monster) throws out in nature. Anyway, the wrack line is actually a little eco-system, full of things that attract all kinds of birds, crabs, raccoons, and other wildlife that feed on things that float in with the "junk". In addition to these visible predators, there are tons of microscopic things that feed on the junk too. So, it is really a wonderful environment teaming with life.

I completed my walk, satisfied that I had absorbed enough sun, sand, and seashells for now (its like coffee you can get enough NOW but tomorrow you will need more!). Sonja texted me and said she was headed to Subway to get lunch and so I walked across the street and joined her for tuna fish sandwiches. OK, so tuna, after seeing and smelling all the treasures in the wrack line may give you the impression that fish, especially tuna, would not be my first choice for food today, but R-O-N-G, WRONG! I actually LOVE tuna and it will take a little more than rotting tube-worms, dead and decaying sponges and coral, putrid smelling dead fish, nasty, slimy, dead horseshoe crabs, and stinky feet to keep me from eating tuna. Well, OK, maybe stinky feet would.

The afternoon was filled with two boat tours including a 3:00pm Dolphin Watch and a 5:15pm Sunset Cruise. I am including many different photos tonight. Hope there are not to many, but I had a lot of good things from my adventures today that I thought you may want to see.

All in all, dolphins treated me right today and the sunset was absolutely MARVELOUS! I love living here on this beach and feel certain that there is not anyone in the world with a better job than I have. Enjoy the photos, tell me how you like them.