Where I Spent My Spring Break
By: Charissa Costa
Place: Florida
Sooo.... as I mentioned I am BURNT. I swear to high Heaven that I wore SPF 30 on my face and SPF 23 or 15 on my body. It didn't matter. I burned. It's weird because I hardly got any color Friday or Saturday, but the Sunday sun just burned me alive.
Anyway, the trip started poorly - the airline lost my luggage. I was so tired from going out the night before and then racing to the airport in torrential rain and thunder to get to my flight, that I was almost in tears when I found out. After filling out all the necessary paperwork, I jumped in a cab with nothing but me and a small carry-on and headed to the hotel. Luckily, my bag was on the next flight to Ft Myers, rather than in Salt Lake City, as the airline originally suspected... so although I landed at 11:30 AM, my luggage made it to me by 5:30 PM. Ho hum. There are worse things, right?
So Friday night was cocktails and a dinner party. Can you believe they had karaoke? Such luck! I haven't karaoke'd since the fall sometime, so I was ecstatic. I sang 'Dancing Queen' (surprise, surprise) and had so much fun. Joe sang karaoke for the first time ever and did a great job... we had a ball.
Saturday and Sunday we were off to Marco Island. I had only been there once before with Jill, and that was on the hotel strip. This time we stayed at a friend's private house on the island and spent all day, both days, out on the water in his speed boat. I have a partial (kind of long) video of a few minutes of our choppy, painful ride out to Ben's Barge to fish on Saturday, but I can't get it to upload for some reason. Ben's Barge is about 3 miles off of the beach. On the way out we hit so many waves we were groaning, but of course I still thoroughly enjoyed myself through the pain.
This was a crazy pelican that seriously stalked us while we fished. Anytime we cast our lines or reeled in, he came towards our lines at top speed trying to steal either the bait or our fish. It was the weirdest thing.
For the record, I caught a NUMBER of fish on the trip - mostly catfish (yum) and blue runners (see below for a short video of one catch). I was hell bent on catching a shark, but the water was so choppy both days that I uh... lost my breakfast on Sunday's trip out and gave up fishing for awhile trying to keep my cool. We were a good five miles out, and the water was ridiculous. It was hard enough to stand and fish... so I have an excuse for getting sick. Oh well.
OH! Then we spent time at this beach place where boaters just run their boats right onto the sand and hang out. It's not accessible by car or anything, so it's just all boats. There was a food boat, a beer boat and plenty of music, dogs, kids and fun. It's actually an outlet (versus an inlet), and we strapped on some life vests, walked a few miles up the beach, and floated down river ever-so-slowly with a beer. It's called lazy river.
Anyway, I don't want to write fifteen pages about my trip, nor can I post all of the photos because I want to respect some folks' privacy... but it was so much fun. It was a few of the best days that I've had in a long time, and although I am ready to get back to work (except for the dull pain I feel from my burn), that trip was enough fun to last me awhile. It was so awesome.
Oh... and here's my all-time fav photo. We're a little crispy (this was Sunday late afternoon), but it's a great photo regardless.
Place: Florida
Sooo.... as I mentioned I am BURNT. I swear to high Heaven that I wore SPF 30 on my face and SPF 23 or 15 on my body. It didn't matter. I burned. It's weird because I hardly got any color Friday or Saturday, but the Sunday sun just burned me alive.
Anyway, the trip started poorly - the airline lost my luggage. I was so tired from going out the night before and then racing to the airport in torrential rain and thunder to get to my flight, that I was almost in tears when I found out. After filling out all the necessary paperwork, I jumped in a cab with nothing but me and a small carry-on and headed to the hotel. Luckily, my bag was on the next flight to Ft Myers, rather than in Salt Lake City, as the airline originally suspected... so although I landed at 11:30 AM, my luggage made it to me by 5:30 PM. Ho hum. There are worse things, right?
So Friday night was cocktails and a dinner party. Can you believe they had karaoke? Such luck! I haven't karaoke'd since the fall sometime, so I was ecstatic. I sang 'Dancing Queen' (surprise, surprise) and had so much fun. Joe sang karaoke for the first time ever and did a great job... we had a ball.
Saturday and Sunday we were off to Marco Island. I had only been there once before with Jill, and that was on the hotel strip. This time we stayed at a friend's private house on the island and spent all day, both days, out on the water in his speed boat. I have a partial (kind of long) video of a few minutes of our choppy, painful ride out to Ben's Barge to fish on Saturday, but I can't get it to upload for some reason. Ben's Barge is about 3 miles off of the beach. On the way out we hit so many waves we were groaning, but of course I still thoroughly enjoyed myself through the pain.
This was a crazy pelican that seriously stalked us while we fished. Anytime we cast our lines or reeled in, he came towards our lines at top speed trying to steal either the bait or our fish. It was the weirdest thing.
For the record, I caught a NUMBER of fish on the trip - mostly catfish (yum) and blue runners (see below for a short video of one catch). I was hell bent on catching a shark, but the water was so choppy both days that I uh... lost my breakfast on Sunday's trip out and gave up fishing for awhile trying to keep my cool. We were a good five miles out, and the water was ridiculous. It was hard enough to stand and fish... so I have an excuse for getting sick. Oh well. OH! Then we spent time at this beach place where boaters just run their boats right onto the sand and hang out. It's not accessible by car or anything, so it's just all boats. There was a food boat, a beer boat and plenty of music, dogs, kids and fun. It's actually an outlet (versus an inlet), and we strapped on some life vests, walked a few miles up the beach, and floated down river ever-so-slowly with a beer. It's called lazy river.
Anyway, I don't want to write fifteen pages about my trip, nor can I post all of the photos because I want to respect some folks' privacy... but it was so much fun. It was a few of the best days that I've had in a long time, and although I am ready to get back to work (except for the dull pain I feel from my burn), that trip was enough fun to last me awhile. It was so awesome.
Oh... and here's my all-time fav photo. We're a little crispy (this was Sunday late afternoon), but it's a great photo regardless.
posted by Charissa at 10:41 PM
5 Comments:
Glad you had a great time. My friend and I use to hit this restaurant in Ft Myers off a pier. I loved it- it was ghetto fabulous... wish I remembered the name. Oh, and if you didn't feel so bad I would yell at you... SPF 15 and 30??? This is Florida! But I shouldn't yell anyway because I got burnt this weekend too. Oh, and that's a pretty nice fish ya got there... you call him Joe? hahaha. j/k
Do they make SPFs higher than 30? That's what the gift shop had!
They make sunscreen as high as 70. For Florida you need at least 45 SPF. I would recommend Neutrogena Ultra Sheer Dry-Touch Sunblock that has an SPF of 70. And use it......
Glad you had some real fun fishing and lazing about.
You're making me antsy. My vacation isn't til the end of August -- we're going to the Outer Banks for a week. But I'm so ready to go RIGHT NOW. Argh!
The reason they only sell the 30 in the gift shop is so the locals can spot a tourist by their bright red skin tone. JK. Those are some great pics. I am glad you had a nice mini vacation down here.
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