Thursday, Sarasota Florida

March 31, Day 27

It turned out we could take pictures anywhere we wanted on the complex, but without a flash.

John and Mabel Ringling gave the state this mansion and museum with its art in the 1930’s. http://www.ringling.org/

On the way to the house we went through the rose garden, three people pruning the roses.


Shirleen's favorite



Many statues place around the garden.

We toured the mansion, the Ca' d’Zan., fashioned after the homes in Venice Italy. Again it is one of those gigantic brick mansion overlooking the bay. The different part about this house was the glass in the windows. It was black glass, clear, then it was painted a see through pastel color. Had we had sunshine, not a tornado watch, it would have danced onto the marble floor. There is a self guide tour we paid for the docent guide. Turned out one of the poorer one we have had. We had wanted to go to the third and fourth floor but because of the weather and the outside steps to the tower, we could not go this time.

The secret garden is to the right of the house with the grave sights behind it.



Wall way stone with rose petals



Many of Peter Paul Rubens large paintings, we viewed four of them and all in one big room. Massive! It was good to have a docent gives us a tour of the six gallery’s of John’s personal purchases.



Painting found in an Italian church bought $250 now worth $125K

 She gave insight to the method and meaning of different parts of the painting. Shirleen even found a Rembrandt among the many painters. The setting for his paintings were in highly decorated rooms not the normal white walled cubes.

Another exhibit was a jade collection, these I could take pictures of, as you see I did.



Angie, this is your Peony fern

 Another exhibit was etched and engraved pictures of flowers which were then painted.

Lunch was on the museum grounds, Shirleen had the Asolo,

a plate of grapes, strawberries, blueberry’s, dried apricots, blue cheese, cheddar cheese, brie cheese and a white hard cheese; I the Caprese Panini, fresh mozzarella, sliced tomatoes and basil on brioche, pressed and served with a cup of portabella mushroom soup with bacon and duck accompanied by a lettuce salad,

Howard Tibbals he has been building the layout for 50 years. He named it Howard Bros. Circus because John Ringling did not leave him use his name.

One usually thinks of a circus as the lion tamer or trapeze artist. I had always wanted to buy the HO scale circus layout but didn’t. This then fits my dreams. What I learned was much. There were about 1,200 people who worked the one day stand. In came the circus, unload each flatbed from a train about 150 wagons. This all takes a bunch of people working together. You have to have a food tent, prepare meals for all these people three times a day, - they had a video of a man flipping pancakes, looked like they speeded up the video but I guess not, who fixes broken wagon wheels, feeds the animals, cares for the sick people and animals, who cuts the peoples hair, who fixes the motors when they need repair, who puts up tents, spreads the sawdust – what have I forgot about a town on wheels. Well this layout has them all. 12,000 could be seated within the big tent. He built each seat in the tent and each chair folds like its big counterpart. It is said that within one of the railcars there is a man with a ledger and cash register with bills in it, all carved out of wood. Each of these figures were hand carved by Howard and he is still adding items.

There was much to view in the museum, old costumes, hand bills, posters and memorabilia.

It is thundering and lightning; I go and get the car for Shirleen, as the umbrella was safely in the car, so there was only one of us to get wet. jerr

Wednesday, Venice Florida

March 30, Day 26 starts out with trying to find Four Mile Cove Ecological Preserve and the Veterans Memorial.

It is tucked besides the bay next to the bridge going toward Ft. Meyers. You drive through residential areas to get there. This is a minimal trail, no guides or literature. An overhead map outlines where you will walk. A little over a mile wall.

The city takes care of the area and Kiwanis have provided benches to sit on and look at the scenery. Again we walk among stands of mangrove. Looking at this picture imagine that these are actually stick people from another world, slow walking but eventually take over the earth!

Along the way are placards that talk about your viewing area, nice touch.

We did not see much wildlife one white egret

and some fiddler crabs mucking around in the mud, a couple lizards and







our friendly crab out for a walk.

Close to the highway is a reproduction of the Iwo Jima statue in DC. It is a state of being relocated and repaired. Alongside is a statue to the Gulf War participants.

A lone black anchor sits on a black granite slab with a brass plate thanking all submarine sailors. The anchor is from the Gato class sub this preceded the Balboa class that the Blackfin was, it was my first boat. These are WWII subs, slow, sneaky and shallow diving, easy targets.

We start north and stop at the Portofino Waterfront Dining at Port Charlotte. We ate there once before but opted to eat there again because there is not much around and it is time. Shirleen had a great tasting steakburger with fried onions with fries; I the Grouper Crococante (fried fish) with vegetables and fries. Off to the Venice area.

We meander through the outback avoiding highways but back roads. Always a nice slower run to look at the local environment, these are real people housing. You can see areas where there was an area where housing started but stopped to a halt, probably due to the economy. Many houses for sale in all the areas we have drove through in southern Florida.

We decided to stay in Venice. Across from Café Italia where we had a quick dinner with wine, Shirleen a bruschetta and I pomodoro pasta with fresh tomatoes topped off with a couple of so-so meatballs. jerr

Tuesday, March 29, Day 25, Sanibel Island, Captiva Island

We started our day visiting Sanibel Island, a barrier island.

We then went to the Sanibel Moorings botanical garden. This is a large motel with walkways which are between the individual units with the beach in front of it and across the street is more of their units along the dock side.

This garden is different because of it not being an area that is within a garden setting but a commercial business.

Throughout these units are well signed plants and trees.

As we were going through the dockside area we stopped in front of a tree, large in size, few leaves and looking like it was on its last leg. A lady, Bette, came to her porch and started telling us about the Shaving Brush Tree. She was a semi-tour leader for this area. The blossom within 20 minutes goes from a bud to flower. She brought out some pictures and I asked if I could take a picture of her with the tree and Shirleen. She was a delight to visit with!




Hybrid Hibiscus

 

Orchids



We then drove up the line; this is a nicely designed island. There are no semaphores, no buildings over 45 feet – for a two story with a park under area. The designed quietness is a pleasure to experience, I can see why this becomes an island retreat. Nice quiet beaches, seashell hunters abound.

We ate at Doc Ford’s Rum Bar and Grill with a couple of rum drinks, Shirleen’s Sanibel Sunset with Blackbeard spiced rum and coconut Jack rum with a splash of amaretto, fresh squeezed Florida orange juice, pineapple juice and grenadine, I Doc’s special with lime, sugar and mint – refreshing.

The spinach salad was loaded with bleu cheese, spiced pecan, granny smith apples, caramelized onions and a smoked bacon dressing and I finally had a Cuban sandwich, ham, roast pork, Swiss cheese and a pickle on a  pressed and warmed bun.

I was wearing my Banff shirt and an older couple walked over to us and asked if we lived there? I said visited, he said they were married 55 years ago and had honeymooned there, both had a smile on their face as I am sure many happy memories flooded forth.

Touring the “Ding” Darling National Wildlife Refuge was next on the agenda. We take the tram again was the way to go for us. Andrew our tour leader, closing in on 80, and a pleasure to be with,


Andrew with hat

  was a birder himself, he was able to tell us what birds we were looking at, history of the island and its original people - the native Calusa Indians who were the first-known residents of the island. The interesting point about these Indians was that they were all over 6 foot tall with some 7 footers. Famous explorer Juan Ponce de Leon five foot four inches found these giants with their boat 4 foot wide, 30 to 40 feet long, big enough to carry these big Indians. He was also believed to have discovered Sanibel Island – which he named “Santa Isybella” after Queen Isabella -- in 1513. We went to a boardwalk where had it not rained the day before we could have seen the mangroves exude the salt from its end leaf area, some were able to find some salt left on some of the leaves.

This is what a new mangrove looks like, it looks like a nut, the root is coming out of the bottom and will detach itself from the branch and can float for a year beofre it will die if it does not to\ake root.The mangroves are cleaned by little crabs that look like spiders and the size of a quarter. Before the 2004 hurricane, the trees were crawling with these, but they have not rebounded as fast as one would expect. Again the three types of mangroves, black, red and white, the leaves produced the colors for the Indian clothing and paintings.

Again we were able to see an alligator, a couple feet off the tram. An interesting point was a group of white pelicans with black underwings which were out in the lowlands. These are supposed to migrated by this time, but were determined to be young ones liking the warm weather.

These pelicans can be sighted in Minnesota. I have spotted them high in the sky travelling in a tight formation.

We have an hour before the Seashell museum closes, off to it. This museum is really nice, not like the one postings ago. The displays are done well, here are some pictures.



Sea Shell Art

 We thought we would take in the sunset – known as the greenflash. This is where at the last minute of the sunset when it just about sinks into the gulf there is a wavelength that flashes green. The gulf having no islands in the way, allow one to see this flash, if it is not a red sunset or cloudy, like ours. Far north on Captiva Island was where we decided to try and catch it. We have time to eat at the Greenflash Restaurant. Shirleen had some nice delicate coconut shrimp, cauliflower and broccoli with a au gratin potato; I a pan seared scallop with a light lime sauce with spinach and spaetzles – a different form, looked like the were sliced thin like a coin and boiled in water then fried in butter.

Shirleen mailed the grand daughters, Danielle and Abby, in the northern most mailbox on Captiva Island.

As we could not get to the only parking lot at the tip of Captiva we went to the church by the Sea and its cemetery. Well no parking permitted, so we visited the old cemetery,

this one goes back to the turn of the century to recent burials. Marked with seashells even on some of the old graves indicates visitors make an effort to remember.

Got to our room at 8:30pm, pooped out so I waited to write-up the days activities. A great day!! jerr

Monday, March 28, Day 24, Bonita Springs Ft. Meyers Beach

On the elevator ride down to the car was a man wearing a baseball cap with WWII, Korean and Vietnam embroider on it. I said all three? He said he was in 41 years and was in all of them. I shook his hand and thanked him for that. He smiled and said thanks.

We decided to go for a walk at, Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary,

maintained by the Audubon society. It is 17 miles to the east of Bonita Springs and Naples out in a sparsely populated area. We took it a couple years ago a 2.25 mile boardwalk through it. There are many areas where you can sit and look at the scenery.

There are many signs along the way explaining what one can see. The boardwalk meanders along with having two paths in case the wood storks are nesting you bypass some areas. They were not there this year, this happens every once and a while. There was a marker standing in the mud of the forest floor, the bottom marking was 16.5 feet above sea level. A couple steps down the line there was water, so I would guess it’s around 16 feet. This is winter down here and the waters are not evident like during the summer. We saw many small birds, herons, egrets,

ibis - center of this picture, hawks, heard a barred owl,



Shirleen's Alligator shot



saw an alligator, and spider’s with their webs.

The fern thickets I saw reminded me of mushroom hunting with Grandpa Izzy and Grandma Jeanette in the bottoms of Cobb’s creek. We found a mother load of mushrooms in and amongst the ferns.

There were a couple places where the boardwalk was modified for the vegetation.



Egret hunting



After 3 hours it is time to leave the quietness of the sanctuary and back to the other forms of life, getting gas for the old buggy.





 

We drove along the Little Hickory Island and Ft. Meyers Beach. There is only one straight line through this area and all I could see is cars and vans, no pickups, ahead of me. The people on bikes were making more headway than we were; well even four guys who were sauntering down the sidewalk were going faster than us. It is midafternoon and we have not eaten. With this line of cars it is time to find a place. Well we go for miles and nothing. Then as we can still not see the end of the line in front of us we find Junkanoo On the Beach restaurant. We were seated by a sliding window and got the fresh breeze of the Gulf. We split a Mama Mia pizza with pepperoni, sausage, fresh tomatoes, mushrooms and onions on a thin crust. They had a Sicilian style, turns out to be a thick crust variety.

Tonight we have a place to stay so no hurry to find a place. Turns out I dined in, ate two leftover pieces of pizza.

Tomorrow Sanibel Island and Captiva Island. jerr

Sunday, March 27, Day 23, headed a little north Coral Gables

The day started with church at St. Williams in Naples. A wealthy church, 7,200 perison ers and a collection of $47,000 last week. For the New Ulm group, there are building a new church for about the same as a new diocese is going to cost. The visiting monsignor from New Jersey was humanistic, mentioning that we all believe in the same God, Baptists, Lutherans and the Jews the first 5 books of the bible in their Koran. He said to make sure we acknowledge our friends in their religion. Looked like 1,200 people or so, filled to the brim, up in the balcony and against all the walls.

We hurry off to the Naples Museum of Art, of the four directions I could have went, it took me three of them to find the right road. This museum is was worth the stop. No pictures of the material.

The gate behind the reclined lady was by Paley a nice piece of art, the man who made it also had other structures on exhibit, not my cup of tea. It did turn out that a foursome from Miami, the art expert I would call him, had a small 18 inch piece of this artists. Turned out he had a couple other artists pieces on exhibit. He had come to see the works of Rauschenberg but it was off exhibit last week.



Two Nuns sitting outside Museum



There was a Chihuly overhead piece along with two hanging chandeliers of his; the light striking the blue one was beautiful.

The lightpaintings by Stephen Knapp, this was a first, http://www.lightpaintings.com/

 he would sandwich a prism between two pieces of glass metallic coatings, shape the lense with curves or corners, angle them to the light with stainless steel brackets. The single light shining thru would give a multidirectional colored beam to the wall behind, pure glowing colors. Just stunning.

Rembrandt and his etchings were on exhibit and it was there last day, about 35 of them. This was a loaned collection. It consisted of beggars from men leaning on canes,

A rat catcher (my favorite) found this online,

 a man making water – you guess what he was doing, lady’s leaning on stick and the strolling musicians. Even a self portrait and one of his father. The detail in these copper etchings, these are original ones, not the ones made from plates of his found and re-engraved. The artist in those days tried to eek out a living by doing small pictures like these, postage size to a 5 by 5 inch couple of pieces. Oh, to even have a copy of one would be neat.

We are in north Naples, well lets drive back to south Naples and take in a

botanical garden. Again well worth it if you like gardens. The temperature reached 27 degrees this year at one point in the garden and had damaged some of the vegetation. We had just an hour before closing. A young man, as we were buying a beer – yes sold beer in the garden – don’t miss the Brazilian, Caribbean and Asian gardens. From a young man, this was a first.

The Brazilian garden was high above the rest and had an attractive water fall, one of those that just sheets off the edge.

At the top were a number of lily ponds,

with curved walkways (similar to the ones we saw in the Amsterdam Floriada in 02).

Walked the labyrinth, some of us did it the right way and another did it her way. We walked thru the gardens which had many seating areas in it. Benches within houses built as they would have been built in their country.

The Caribbean had a scene of a natural influence of the area.

The Asian garden demonstrated the cultures from Bali to Vietnam;

temples, ruins, sculptures and

distinctive water gardens. Where we sat and watched the quiet nature of the garden.

Off for dinner. We drive up highway 41, pass some steakhouses but not many cars. We gave up and stop at a grill, were seated, and I said this is not what you are looking for. We got up and walked out, as we did there was a couple our age walking in, I asked where there was a good steakhouse. He said 4 or so miles back “Andre’s Steakhouse”, we had seen it but not many cars and we kept going. This time we pull up as a gigantic blue Royals Royce pulled in.

I parked to the edge of the parking lot. The owner, Andre, welcomed us and seated us the waiter described the experience we were to have. The steaks would be fired in a 1,400 degree oven, somewhat standard for nice places, brought out on a sizzling hot plate, pre-sliced and floating in hot butter.

The plate, as you can see, is tipped so that the hot butter goes to the bottom of the dish. The hot butter can be spooned over the steak in case it was under done. As you can see it was different, Shirleen had her filet and I a veal chop, both were juicy, hot and tender. We shared a plate of German fried potatoes. These potatoes are half inch cubed and roasted with onions. This rates as one of the best meals we have ever had. To me it looked like what I had seen on Food network at Peter Lugers in New York. Andre sat down with us and I mention what a nice experience, it reminded me of Luger steakhouse, he said I worked there for 8 years before starting this place.



Shirleen and Andre

Calling it a night, will post this tomorrow. jerr