FAMILY VISIT

 My sister. Lynda and my son, Bob arrived at Orlando TT at 2:00 a.m. January 2 after driving 18 hours straight from Philadelphia. We celebrated Christmas with them on Friday. On Saturday Larry took the RV to Peace River TT in Wauchula while Lynda, Bob and I went to Ybor City and then to St Petersburg.

  I was surprised to find the pier closed, of course it has been over 15 years since I was here.

 On Sunday afternoon we rented this little cabin for Bob to stay in for the week.

 A little tiny but great for a place for Bob to sleep. It was better then the ground outside where he was biten up or on the floor in the RV.

 Bob takes great pictures with his phone but he used Lynda's camera for the shot of Peace River's resident alligator.

 Our big trip on Monday was to Big Cypress National Preserve. It is part of the Everglades but there is hunting and land ownership in this area where there isn't any in Everglades National Park just south of here.

 We were guaranteed we would see alligators at the Oasis visitor center.

 We sure did.

 And we saw an anhingas.

 We then drove to the Gulf coast to look for shells on Sanibel Island.

 We drove around to Captiva to see the sunset, but it was a little to early.

 As we left the island we saw the sun setting.

 On the way home we had a delicious Italian dinner at Lamotta's in Ft. Myers.

 On Wednesday we went over to the coast again and enjoyed time at Siesta Beach.

 The sand is beautiful here and we took a long walk along the beach.

 The water was 69, a little warmer then the air. I enjoyed walking in it.and could have gone in for a dip if I had my swim suit with me.

 Thursday we visited Solomon's Castle. It is a unique place to visit.

 We took the tour and enjoyed all his unusual art work and humor.

 We ate at the Boat in the Moat which is right on the grounds and run by the family.

 We had a good lunch, just as we remembered when we ate here a few years ago.

 We then went to see the Lipizzaner stallions.

 This is where they train the horses and riders for the show when they are on tour. So there was a lot of do overs. It will be fun to go back in March and see how they have progressed.

 Friday we went to Center Hill Farm to pick strawberries. They sure are good.

My sister and son left on Saturday morning at 9:00. They were planning to stop at a hotel on the way home but once again decided to drive straight through and arrived back in Philadelphia at 3 a.m. We had a very nice visit and I always miss them when they leave.