March 17, 18 & 19

 

Geocaching Event and Receiving Guests

 

We didn’t do anything special on March 17th, but we while we were running errands, we ate lunch outside at one of my favorite restaurants.

 

 

On March 18^th, we attended a geocaching puzzle solving event. Even though we consider ourselves puzzle challenged, Cordell has been working hard for over a year on finding some solutions. The minds of the cache owners never cease to amaze me and there are few to none puzzles that I can make any headway on.

 

It was fun to meet some other geocachers and put faces to some names that we have seen written on logs. We did learn a few new tricks, but it was discouraging to realize how much we don’t know.

 

 

Cordell spent some time crafting decorated stones that we put in caches for trade items.

 

 

Sunday, March 19^th, we were at Hope Lutheran Church again. Pastor Browning has been teaching a series “The Jesus I Never Knew”. Today’s sermon focused on purpose—what Jesus came to do.

 

The Pastor frequently makes use of visuals in his sermons and today he showed us gadgets and discussed the purpose for each. There was a charging station that hides messy cords.

 

 

He showed us a tiny camera that can be attached to your dog’s collar so you can see what your dog sees.

 

 

Then there was a solar bird repeller.

 

 

How about a machine that toasts pictures on you bread?

 

 

 

Then he showed this painting “The Calling to Saint Matthew” by the Italian artist Caravaggio. We were reminded that Matthew was a tax collector who would have been despised by his fellow Jews for what was seen as collaborating with the Roman occupation force.  Jesus responded to criticism by telling the people that He did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance. Matthew answered Jesus’ call and became one of the 12 apostles.  

 

 

Pastor Ramsey is an Associate Pastor who retired here to the area and does not serve full time. When he closes the service, he encourages us to bring a little of Heaven to people who cross our path.

 

 

 

We were very joyful because our son Andy, his wife, Corinne, and our granddaughter, Janelle, arrived later in the afternoon to spend a week with us.

 

 

It didn’t take them long at all to get into a relaxing mode.

 

 

 

 

Janelle is on spring break from her first year in college and she had several assignments she needed to complete. I admired her dedication to begin working right away.

 

 

I think Andy, Corinne and Janelle enjoyed being able to eat dinner out on the lanai. Sometimes, Cordell and I take it for granted since we are able to do it so often.

 

 

March 16, 2017

Historic Bonita Springs

The temperatures were a bit cooler today, but you would never know it by looking at the great blue heron that frequents the lake behind our lanai.

 

 

 

Our mission today was to take a walking tour with the Hausers in Historic Bonita Springs.

 

A seven stage multi-geocache was created at the end of January and the four of us were anxious to take this tour. At each stage, we were required to find information that is used to determine the GPS coordinates for the location of the final physical container.

  

 

Stage 1 began at the site of the Liles Hotel, a hotel-campground complex that catered to the fish and game tourists in the late 1920's.

 

 

 
In the 1940's, individual cottages were added. Some of those cottages have been moved behind the hotel and are now rented as studios to local artists.

 

 

 

The present building, a reconstruction of the original hotel, is occupied by a city government department and contains pictures, exhibits and information on Bonita Springs history.

 

 

 

At this first stage, we had to count the number of starfish that decorated the walls along the outside fountain.

 

 

 

On the hotel grounds was an old water tower that had been relocated to this site to help preserve some of the history of Bonita Springs.

 

 

 

From the water tower, we had to look around for a work of art, entitled “Slices of Heaven”, that depicted fruit associated with Florida. Information for Stage Two was the number of pieces of fruit.

 

 

 

Stage 3 took us to the Everglades Wonder Gardens which is claimed to be Florida’s oldest attraction park. What began 77 years ago as a collection of reptiles and wildlife has now become a non-profit organization that is a refuge for rescued wildlife and an exhibit of worldwide trees and vegetation. We did not tour the gardens, as we only had to get information off the large sign.

 

 

Phases 4 and 5 took us to murals depicting many historical elements of the town’s history. We learned that in the 1870’s government surveyors camped along the waterway now known as the Imperial River. After the crew left, the site became known as Survey. Further down in time, a developer had the name changed to Bonita Springs in an effort to have a more appealing name for investors. Bonita was his daughter’s name. We had to count the number of windows on the Dome Restaurant in one mural and ascertain the artist’s phone number in the other.

 

 

Phase 6 took us to the Shangri-La Inn Resort & Spa, which was originally built in 1921 and known as the Heitman Hotel. The 25 room hotel was built to give potential buyers a place to stay while their houses were being constructed. Besides being an inspiration for the city’s name, the source of sulfuric water on the property became a marketing focus.

 

 

 

We had to locate a huge tree with protruding roots on the property and determine the scientific name for it.

 

 

Often we have a bit of concern when completing a multi-stage cache because just one wrong piece of information or errors in calculating information can result in GPS coordinates that direct us to an entirely wrong place. However, even though the four of us have been retired for several years now, our collective minds of an engineer, an accountant, a para-legal and a school teacher have not been completely retired. We were happy to find the final physical cache exactly where we expected it to be.

 

 

Along our tour we saw some other interesting sites.  A tree located in Riverside Park is named “The Freedom Tree” and is dedicated to LCDR Roger Emrich and all prisoners of war and missing in action. I thought this was a very nice way to remember these brave military personnel who sacrificed so much for all of us.

 

 

 

We liked the stone archway leading into the park.

 

 

 
A statue of a boy with a hoop was in the park.

 

 

 
Lords of the Forest sculpture inspired me to engage in some child’s play

 

 

We enjoyed spending an extended period of time in this beautiful town, seeing a variety of structures and artwork while learning so much history. It was better than reading a history book.

 

 

 

No Snow for Us!!

March 13^th dawned with a moon set.

 

 

I received an e-mail message from CVS reminding me that snow was on the way and to pick up extra supplies.

 

 

Meanwhile, here in Fort Myers, we weren’t particularly worried about snow.

 

 

Instead of snowplows, we saw bush hogs. 

 

We drove with the Hausers to Punta Gorda and spent a very successful day finding 23 geocaches.

 

 

 

 

 Some sites warned us to look for something other than a geocache.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I really like to see flowers blooming at this time of the year.

 

 

When the sun set, the four of us were ready to set also!!

 

 

On March 15^th we hiked around in Charlotte Harbor Preserve State Park in Punta Gorda. This park is comprised of 43,404 acres and protects more than 100 miles of shoreline along Charlotte Harbor in Charlotte and Lee Counties.  It is the third largest Florida State Park.  Visitors can take advantage of opportunities to hike, fish, paddle and observe wildlife in the park's many natural communities, including mangrove forests, marshes, scrub habitats and pine flatwoods.

 

 

 

 

We were looking for geocaches as usual.

 

 

We found a few caches elsewhere before we headed back to our condo.