Sanibel Island Vacation Diary - Day 4Click the audio controls below to start the audio diary. The button in the center is the play button. You can control the volume with the slider on the left. The transcript is also included below. [7 minutes, 12 seconds]
Saturday, June 18, 2005 [Ed. note: audio says June 19th, but this was Saturday, the 18th.] Fred: Susan got up and went out to the beach, as usual and I slept a little later, but I did get up earlier than I have in the last couple of days. I think I got up at about 10 and decided to go on out to the beach and take some pictures and get some video and walked around the grounds here at Sanibel Moorings and took pictures. Got some pictures of the amazing flowers and trees and plants that they have. They do really an amazing job of making the place seem like a forest. It's well kept and it's just really well done. I think it's one of the best places on the island if you want to see all kinds of plants. They even have fruit and things that you can pick and use it if you want it. In fact, there's an avocado tree, literally, right outside our balcony and, haven't picked any before, but there are several avocado on the tree right now. But we came back in and decided to get some breakfast/lunch. Really it was noon. Went back to the Lighthouse Café and both got the same meal that we had the other day. Once again, it was excellent. Had a very good waitress and then we came back to the condo and decided to both head out to the beach. Susan got out there a little earlier than I did. I of course had to check some emails and take care of a couple of things, but when I got out to the beach, Susan was out in the water and yelled to me to come out there and what it turned out, there was a group of manatee swimming very slowly as they do. Probably, what would you say, eight, nine manatee?
Susan: Uh, yes and there were some that were really large. Maybe eight or nine fee long and then some you could tell--there were a couple of babies there too that they were swimming in, I guess you would call their "pod" and just slowly swim along. Didn't seem to be affected, all the people on the beach were going out as far as they could to see them and you could tell people were excited. I got fairly close and could see their snouts coming up every once in a while, so it was pretty cool. Fred: I got some video footage of that but unfortunately I had to actually run in and get the camera and run back out there. I just couldn't seem to really catch up to them and get a good shot, so we'll see how that video turns out, but anyway, that was a unique experience. We've never seen manatee out there before. I guess we've seen a couple of dolphin and, just other fish, but nothing like that, so that was a neat experience. Then we spent some time on the beach. Stayed out there for a few more hours and then came back in and decided to get some dinner at a place called Lavigna, which is an Italian restaurant that's a family-owned restaurant. Real Italian food. Really excellent flavor. I had a Chicken Parmesan with spaghetti and tomato sauce and, Susan, what did you have? Susan: I had a Caesar salad and Chicken Ravioli with sort of a light, I guess they actually call it a pink sauce, with garlic. It was really good. Fred: So how would you compare Lavigna to other places that we've eaten or just to other Italian food you've had? Susan: It's good. I mean I've always had a good meal there. I think Traders is probably still one of my favorites along with the Jacaranda and the Sanibel Steakhouse. Those are my three favorite, more upscale places to eat that I really enjoy. Fred: We were pleasantly surprised to be the only people in the restaurant for probably 15 minutes. We got there right at 6:00 p.m. and I guess we were eating earlier than most people do. So that was nice to not have to compete over voices and cries of other people and children. In fact, it's really, I don't know that we've ever seen too many children in there for whatever reason. I mean they don't prohibit kids, but anyway, maybe children aren't big Italian fans. I don't know. But it was a good meal. Oh yes, I didn't mention the price for Lavigna. The total bill was $61.20 plus tip, so that included a single glass of wine. It's a little more expensive, I guess than some places, but it was worth it. It was good. And I did bring home leftovers, so I'll have another meal to get out of that. That makes it a little cheaper if you're computing it cost-per-meal. Once we left there, we drove down just to see what movies were playing at the theater and decided we'll probably go see a movie tomorrow night and then we left there and did a little more driving around to see what trees and other things had been downed and damaged. Then we wound up going to Jerry's, which is a grocery store and they also have a number of different shops there that have decorations and we also went into a place where we were able to buy some t-shirts and we each got a t-shirt and we actually did go into the grocery store and just bought a gallon of water and then that was it. We came home and watched a DVD that we had rented from NetFlix and we'll just send that on back in the mail Monday. We'll drop that in the mail. So that's a neat idea if you're a NetFlix user, bring your NetFlix movies with you and watch them down here, 'cause all the units (at least at Sanibel Moorings) do have a DVD player.
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