Fabulous Day On Pine Island!

Ken and I had a great night's sleep and were not in a hurry to get up.  We got ready, cooked breakfast, packed our lunches, and Ken loaded our bikes on the CRV.  I called Doloris back in PA around 10 AM.  Fred and she were leaving for Venice FL in about a 1/2 hour and the 4 of us will meet up before noon on Sunday when we arrive at Rambler's Rest CG outside of Venice!  We are so anxious to be able to spend a week with them showing them some of our favorite places and events!

We left the CG around 10:30 and parked at the community park in the center of town.  We got on our bikes and headed north towards Bookelia.  We love that bike ride passing many palm plantations, the place where they grow starfruit, and the mango orchards.

I love the trunks of these palm trees! 

Notice all the starfruit hanging on these trees!

Boy, they did a great job trimming these palm trees.  Last year
you had to "duck" the low lying branches!

Gorgeous palm trees everywhere!

They have these "leaning" palms planted in groups of 4!

I guess that is why they intentionally grow them this way!

We took a side ride to a housing area and then a condo development.  We talked to some people who asked if we had seen the owl.  After giving us directions of its location, we retraced our "tracks" and sure enough, we saw the owl in its nest.  We also noticed an osprey nest on top of a house chimney - looked like a problem to us!  We noticed an alligator too!  We continued heading towards the end of the island and at the same time, Ken and I saw an open wallet lying on the bike trail.  Now what do we do? So, I started looking through the wallet to try to find a phone number.  Did find the owners drivers license and some phone numbers.  So, we tried the 1 number and it was to a friend in Maine.  When we told her our location it helped verify that we were on the "up and up".  So she called the owner and we met him at the Bookelia Post Office about 5 minutes away.  It was an older gentleman from Maine who is riding bike regularly to help him gain strength since having a stroke.  He never knew his wallet fell out of his pocket.  He was so grateful and we were thrilled to find the owner.  We are so glad we found it for not only did it have all his cards inside, but it contained over $800.00 in cash!

What a good picture of the horned owl!

It is hard to tell, but we think that is the baby owl in front of
its mother!

These osprey could get very "warm" if the home owners start
a fire in their fireplace!

A 10 foot alligator "sunning!

We rode to the end of the island to the fishing pier and then back to our CRV.  We were back to the CG by 2:30 after riding bike for 20 miles and we were hungry.  We hadn't planned to be gone so long and our lunches were in the CRV, so we decided to wait to eat until we got back to Waldo.  We ate, showered, and then Betsy brought me a stone she had found and wanted me to wire wrapped.  No problem!  She left and Ken and I got ready for Happy Hour here at Waldo at 4:45 with Tom, Becky, Neil and Nancy.  We had not met Tom and Becky until here at Pine Island but they are fulltimers who sold their home in Mt. Gretna about 4 years ago. We sat outside chatting until it got a little cool and then we headed inside Waldo.  It was a wonderful time of sharing and getting to know each other.  We had such an enjoyable time, only ending the evening at 8.  Tom and Becky are coming to Rambler's Rest on Wednesday for 2 weeks, so we will have a chance to get together again.  Neil and Nancy will be with us again here in Pine Island when the 4 of us return the 1st two weeks of March!  That's when Chuck and Melissa arrive too!  Hallelujah!!

A wonderful evening of fellowship with friends!

We cleaned up and watched some TV before calling it a day.  Another great day in Paradise!