Naples

Naples turned out to be exactly what we were hoping for when we planned this “escape from winter” trip. Every day was sunny with the temps in the 70’s to low 80’s. It was incredibly relaxing but with enough to do to keep us as busy as we wanted to be.

Cars on 5th

Can you say Bougie? The city of Naples is lovely (and high end)! On our first day, we headed into town to go to the weekly farmer’s market. While driving there, we were surprised by the number of luxury cars. Everywhere we looked, we saw Maseratis, Lamborghinis, Bentleys and Alfa Romeos (not to mention the Aston Martins, McLarens, and….well you get the idea). It turned out to be an annual event called “Cars on 5th” which is a very, very high end car show that occurs along one of the main drags of the city. We saw hundreds of beautiful cars, both old and new, of all makes and models. (Christina’s favorite was a $350,000 Aston Martin, of course!) It was a fun little find!

We thought about purchasing this to haul behind the Airstream. ;-)

Naples Farmers Market: I had to add this for fun. Not everyday you see a guy with a machete cutting a coconut.

Quick stop in Venice

Christina has a cousin that lives near Venice (Florida, not Italy), and we took the opportunity to meet for dinner. We drove up in the morning and had lunch in their historic downtown (which for the record does NOT look like Venice, Italy despite what their marketing says). We enjoyed a tasty pizza at Made in Italy before strolling main street. Our biggest observation was there are a lot of old people in Venice. It was almost like a convention was happening. They have a 20-mile bike trail that connects Venice to Sarasota. We loaded Mack in his bike trailer (which he is learning to tolerate) and road about 8 miles along a canal running through Venice.

Bonita Springs

We took Mack to a pop-up dog party in Bonita Springs which was a lot of fun for him and an opportunity for us to connect with a local dog sitter. (Thank you, Mindi, for the hook up!) We toured their historic downtown which appears to be undergoing a renaissance, and had lunch at a local favorite called Coconut Jack’s. The drinks were good and the view was great!

Marco Island for Dinner

Our final night in the area, we visited Marco Island where we had a delicious dinner at Oyster Social. Marco Island is another high-end area, and we certainly stood out as we drove “The beast” - our Ford F250 tow vehicle with our bikes strapped on top of the bed - through town. Oh, it’s a sight to see, believe me. ;-) The Valet driver’s eyes about popped out when we pulled up. He was shaking his head before he even got to us to let us know there was no way the truck was fitting into the garage where they parked the cars. He ultimately took sympathy on us and said he knew a spot that would work, but let us know about 3 times that it was a long way away….a shameless, but effective play for a tip!!

Everglades

American crocodile…you can tell by the narrow snout and visible teeth…all ~80 of them!

As Naples is only about 40 minutes north of the Everglades, we were able to check off national park #23. First, we took an airboat ride through a mangrove swamp. This turned out to be fun and educational. The boat was flying through very tight quarters, at times, which made us pay close attention to the instruction to “keep your head and arms inside the ride at all times”. Though we didn’t see any alligators, we did visit an alligator breeding area and got a pretty good dose of alligator facts. For example:

An alligator can, in extreme situations, go more than two years without eating (whereas John is lucky to last 2 hours)
The sex of a baby alligator is determined entirely by the heat of the nest while it is in its egg
Alligators can jump vertically half their total body length (impressive and horrifying)

Our second Everglades adventure was a 15-mile bike ride through Shark Valley. If you want to see alligators up close, in the wild, this is a must do. During the few hours we were there, we saw dozens, if not scores, of alligators, and one really big American Crocodile! The gators ranged in size from 12” babies to 12’ monsters. And “up close” in this case meant “don’t run over that one’s tail!” At one point, we got off our bikes to do a short hike, but about 40’ up the trail, we came upon a ~8’ gator lying in the middle of the path. ( Image Below) We were out!! And quickly decided there and then that biking was better than hiking!

Naples, FL/Everglades