15 March 2025
As we anticipated our son and his family arriving this evening, we took care of some chores, relaxed a bit, and prepared the boat for our visitors. I worked on the Blog to get it up to date knowing I would be busy for the next few days having more fun to write about in the next update. Clark took out his guitar and played non-church songs just for fun.
We planned to meet our friend, John aka "Johnny Live", for lunch today. On our way walking out of the marina, we came across some boating friends by the pool. Tomorrow would be Clark's birthday, and today turned out to be Roxanne's birthday. They are the same age just one day apart. We grabbed a couple of birthday photos before continuing on our way.
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| Ev & Clark |
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| Roxanne & Clark |
John and I left it to Clark to decide where we should eat today. He picked the 7-Mile Grill. I had never eaten there, and John had not eaten there this season, so it turned out to be a win-win for all. The restaurant is close enough to bike to, but John very kindly picked us up and drove us there to save us the time and effort.
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| Clark & John |
After John dropped us off back at the marina, we headed back to the boat to begin prepping the boat for the family. Linens needed to be pulled out, and sofas needed to be converted into beds. The piece parts for these activities had to be dug out of storage. Space had to be made for suitcases, etc. With that activity completed, we decided to walk up to the pool bar to check out tonight's entertainment.
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| Lady A Blues Band |
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| Decoration for Full Moon Party at Pool Bar |
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| Sunset at Marlin Bay |
On the way, our son, Chris, texted that the GPS ETA read 8:30. As we walked out the gate to look for them, they were just pulling up in the car at 8:33! Great timing! With hugs all around for Chris, Heather, Lillian aka Lil, and Jack, we were ready to enjoy some family fun over the next few days.
16 March 2025 - Sunday - Clark's Birthday
While the family got themselves settled in, Clark and I jumped on our bikes and went to church as per usual. Clark was playing in the band. Before the services got underway, Pastor Debra announced that it was his birthday and everyone sang Happy Birthday to him (much to his dismay). We later learned that another member of the church, Janet, shares the same day birthday with him. She made sure to remain quiet until after services so as not to bring attention to herself.
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| Church Band Nancy (Mandolin), Tom (leader), John (singer), Steve (banjo), Clark (Guitar) (Bob who plays drums cannot be seen in photo) |
After we returned back to the boat following church, we quickly grabbed lunch and headed over to Sombrero Beach. The grandkids love going to the beach. They were disappointed in Sombrero Beach for two reasons. First, we were greeted by a sign saying that a no-swim advisory was in effect due to bacteria in the water. Secondly, the beach had a large quantity of Man-o-War Jellyfish in the water and scattered across the beach.
These poisonous jellyfish look like small, inflated, blue balloons! Many people do not even know what they are. We passed a very nice sand castle as we looked for a place to sit on the beach. The top of the sand castle had a Man-o-War jellyfish sitting on top of it as a decoration. Someone had to have picked it up to put it there!
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| Sombrero Beach, Marathon, FL |
We found an empty spot on the beach to put down towels, etc. All but I decided to go for a walk down the beach. Chris, Clark and the kids walked over to Sisters Creek and waded into the water. They dug a well into the sand that filled with water before walking back through the park.
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| Lillian, Chris, Jack, and Clark (Heather not in picture) |
As I sat roasting in the sun, I continued to think they would be back soon. That turned out to be a bad assumption. Eventually, when I was "well done", I decided to go in search of the crew.
I did not immediately find them, but in my search, I did come across the pastor of our church in a pavilion holding a "Celebration of Life" service for one of their long-time parishioners. Debra said she had not seen Clark, so I continued on my hunt. Eventually I saw them in the distance heading for the playground equipment.
Sometimes Clark makes me wonder exactly how old he is ...
Besides riding on the merry-go-round, Clark helped Chris push it!
Clark said that we would have been better off had we gone to the beach at Sister's Creek instead of the one on the ocean. We should remember that for next time.
After the beach, we decided to go to Sweet Savannah's for ice cream & cookie treats as I had a gift card burning a hole in my pocket!
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| Chris & Heather at Sweet Savannah's |
Jack and Lillian found the arcades located there.
Lillian found an interesting way to play the game though I don't think it helped her score.
For dinner tonight, we dried off, got changed, and went to Lazy Days.
After dinner, we took some sunset pictures at the marina as we walked back to the boat.
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| Heather, Lil, Chris, Jack, Clark, Ev |
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| Lil, Chris, Jack |
17 March 2025 - St. Patrick's Day
Unfortunately, a front came through bringing with it high winds of around 24 knots. As such we looked for things to do where the wind would not be a factor. We started the day playing pool / billiards and an indoor shuffleboard game in the Marlin Room at the Club House.
After lunch we headed to the library to see what mischief we could get into there.
We found various activity kits including ones to make graduation caps which turned out to be a bit on the large size!
Next we found some word search puzzles and pictures to color.
Jack and Ev played a game of chess. Jack is new to the game, and I have not played in years (and was never good at the game). Jack lost too many pieces, and I could not figure out how to get him into checkmate although I had him in check multiple times. We gave up before finishing the game.
The highlight of the day was a trip to the Turtle Hospital that Chris scheduled for 4:00 - the last show of the day. I decided to stay home on the boat. I really have no interest in observing injured turtles especially at $35 per person.
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| A turtle in the doctor's office for eye cleaning |
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| Turtle tank |
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| Lil |
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| Looking in the turtle tank |
I prefer to go to Sombrero Beach when they have a "Turtle Release". Once a turtle has recovered and deemed fit, they are released back into the ocean at the beach. Many people turn out for the event.
Heather and Chris left the rest of us for the night and went to the Butterfly Café for dinner. The rest of us ate on the boat and watched Moana on Disney+. The grandkids had chicken nuggets, broccoli, and fries while Clark and I had frozen pizza for dinner.
18 March 2025 - Tuesday
We had some spare time in the morning before heading off for today's big adventure at Aquarium Encounters, so we went back to the Club House to shoot some pool. While we were there, some a brother and sister came in and wanted to play. I worked on this week's jigsaw puzzle while the four of them played pool.
I was very impressed by the young boy who took time to instruct Jack on the proper way to hold the cue. Where he would not follow my instructions, he was careful to listen to this young man. The visitors were not boaters, but were instead, staying in one of the condos.
Before heading off to the aquarium, we packed some sandwiches to eat later. We arrived around 12:30 and stayed for about three hours exploring the grounds and checking out the aquatic life living there.
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| Heading in ... |
We decided to join the tour that started at 12:50 to get the lay of the land. Zach was our tour guide.
He showed us the various exhibits and explained about feeding and touching the wildlife there.
We walked by the parrotfish area, and Zach threw in a bunch of pellets to bring them around for viewing.
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| Parrotfish |
He told us about the touch tank.
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| Sea Urchin and Starfish Touch Tank |
He said we could feed the turtles (later)
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| Turtles! |
and told us to beware the Pig-nose turtles and alligators that bite!
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| Pignose Turtle |
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| American Alligators |
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| Lobster |
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| Look very closely to see miniature seahorses |
Zach told us about ways we are trying to reduce the invasive Lionfish population by eating them and teaching aquatic predators that they are a tasty treat for them as well.
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| Lionfish |
Chris bought a punch card so the kids had fun opportunities for feeding fish and turtles.
Lettuce for the turtles
and cut up fish for the rays.
The rays practically climbed out of the tank to get the fish morsels being fed to them.
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| Shark |
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| Hermit Crab |
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| Lettuce for these guys too |
The aquarium is directly next to Vaca Cut. We walked down to take a look!
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| Boats traveling through the cut |
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| Pelicans hanging around hoping for food from aquarium visitors (bridge over Vaca Cut in background) |
We found a place selling food at the aquarium, but since we brought sandwiches and snacks, we just grabbed one of the picnic tables to have our lunch.
As we wandered around, we found a woman giving a lecture on American Alligators. She had a 6-month old gator in her hands.
After three hours of seeing the aquarium exhibits, we were ready to call it quits and head back to the boat. With the family here for only a few days, we had to pack in as much as possible in the time allocated. When we got back to the boat, we rolled out the paint and the coconuts we had collected to do some coconut decorating. We ended up with rainbow and patriotic designs.
Since these works of art would not fit in suitcases, we have been asked to transport them back to NJ on the boat. Yay!?
Having seen a lot of fish today, we naturally decided to go to the Island Fish Co. restaurant to eat some! We looked into eating at the Steak and Lobster House but the wait was too long, so we went to a bigger restaurant and got a table right away.
We managed to get some sunset pictures from the west side of the marina tonight.
We played some card games and Cats Cradle before time for bed.
19 March 2025
Lillian and Jack had a list of things they wanted to do, but as today was our last day together, we had to "cherry pick" from that list. We started the day, once again, playing pool up at the Club House. We made good use of the swimming pool one more time, and we ended the visit with a trip to play Miniature Golf.
On our way to the Club House, we spied a manatee floating in the inner basin. It did not move at all for so long, I feared it was deceased. Eventually, it put its head up for a sip of air. We decided it must be napping.
At the Marlin Room, we found that the Salvador Dali jigsaw puzzle had been completed! When I left it the other day, only white pieces remained. I was happy to see it finished.
The water in the swimming pool was quite cool today compared to a couple of days ago when it felt too warm. Before getting dried off, we all took a dip in the hot tub to warm up! Brrr!
Heather had everything packed ready for departure. Before they left, however, Heather said the kids could cross one more thing off their list. We went to Porky's to play Miniature Golf on the new course they have there.
Tropical theme ...
Flora ..
Water hazard ..
The results were erratic. 5 hits was the maximum stroke count for a hole. Some holes the kids went over the max (the course was basically empty when we played with no one behind us), and some came out as a hole in one! Only Chris, Jack, and Lillian signed up to play. Chris let me play out the last 3 of the 18 holes for him.
When we left Porky's, Clark told Chris to pull into the Fishermen's Hospital lot to drop us off. With a traffic light there, it is safe to cross Route 1 and an easy, short walk back to the marina. This way Chris did not have to fight with Route 1 traffic to make a second left-hand turn back onto the highway - one is more than enough!
As soon as we got back on the boat, I dove in to start putting the boat back together - stripped beds, turned beds into sofas, gathered up laundry, emptied trash, etc. I signed up for two time slots for laundry tomorrow to wash all the clothes, sheets, and towels used over the past few days.
Once that was done, we relaxed by the tv until it was time for bed.
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