Highs and lows of our 5th trip to Florida Travelling to Marco island 17/08/19

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Today has been a busy but lovely day as we are leaving our Villa in Davenport to move onto our new Villa on Marco Island.
I got up early, stripped the beds and put the washing on. I checked my sugars and they were behaving so all good there. Sadly my Libre sensor has had enough of the punishment that it has received in the past 8 days and is no longer working so now I am back to the traditional finger pricking to see what my blood sugars are. In preparation for the drive I put my insulin in its Frio pouch to keep it cool.
We were ready to leave our villa by 10am.
We put our new address into google maps and it said that our journey would be 179 miles long and would take just over 3 hours.
Google maps really has been a game changer this holiday in comparison to our old satnav which could be slow and had a tendency to take you to somewhere entirely different from where you requested. Last year we asked it to navigate to Kennedy Space Station. We arrived at a lovely little house around 80 miles away!😟
So Google took us on a mixture of the Florida Turnpike and some smaller roads well away from the tourist routes. I did start to think it might be playing games with me but eventually the landscape changed from busy built up Orlando to this

We saw signs warning of Alligstors and Florida Panthers!

As we hadn't had any breakfast we stopped halfway for lunch a Burger King. It was interesting passing through Florida cities and James and Lily were both surprised to see lots of trailer parks and houses that had Tin rooves and were very simple. Not all big villas with their own pools.
We carried on driving and eventually arrived on Marco Island

The island is small at five miles long by four miles wide. It is however very built up with big buildings, hotels and supermarkets.
We arrived at 2pm and couldn't get into the villa until 4pm so we went to have a look at the Marina.
There was a small bar and lots of fishing charters available to hire, we are going see fishing on Monday.

Meet the locals

We ordered a drink and sat at the bar looking out at the water.

Whilst we sat there massive shoals of Tarpon were topping in the water, they were all around 5 foot long! I tried to get a picture but it was tricky

As we sat there a boat came in from fishing and they had lots of Lane Snapper and Grouper.

Mark was getting very excited by now!
I have a very busy stressful job and managing a 50 hour week alongside family life and complex medical conditions can be hard work. As I sat there I felt so relaxed and I am really looking forward to the week ahead.
We left the marina so that Mark could go and get his fishing bait from the tackle shop and then went to Publix to get some essentials. We have eaten out all week in Orlando and had big breakfasts every day so that we didn't need to spend fortunes on food in the parks. As we are going to be more relaxed this week I got a few things in for breakfast and snacks.
James is obviously spending too much time in America as apparently apples dipped in peanut butter are a good breakfast. We got some bread, ham, fruit and wine and off we went to find our villa.
Now I have been looking at pictures of this place for nearly a year and although we loved our villa in Davenport and it had everything we needed and more, this place is unbelievable!
Master bedroom and en-suite

James and Lilys rooms

Living area

Pool area

Fishing dock and Tikki Bar

We unpacked our bags, James and Lily jumped in the pool

Mark dipped his shrimp 😁 and caught a catfish

This had very sharp barbs on it so only a matter of time before someone hurts themselves.
James had a go at fishing

We are now going to take a walk around the island and explore, hopefully we will find somewhere nice to eat.
We walked out from the villa for around 20 minutes, as we walked we saw some beautiful villas but also some scruffy looking buildings. When you think of an island you may picture sandy beaches and pretty buildings but it looks like a normal American town. There are nice beaches that we will be visiting but we are unable to see them from our villa.
We walked to CJ's on the Bay. Service was good and a nice varied menu with lovely views across the bay. We ate our dinner, had a little stroll along the water looking at the nice boats and checked out another restaurant for another night. We we were all pretty tired after our long day so we walked home and had a glass of wine in front of the TV.

Thank you for reading

[Hidden mickey]

I really enjoyed reading your post, it looks very lovely.

[saratogajan]

It looks fantastic. We’re staying at Marco island beach resort in April. Hope it’s a nice as your villa looks!

[Bee happy]

Looks lovely,villa looks amazing. Where did you book it ? Have a fab time

[snowbelle]

We are staying at the Marco Island Beach resort next Month , thank you for posting .

Its a new area for us .. have done Naples , most of the Gulf Coast and the Keys so thought we would have a change it looks very laid back .

I haven't fished in years & not sure if DH ever has but it does still hold a fascination for me especially sea fishing.

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Originally Posted by snowbelle

We are staying at the Marco Island Beach resort next Month , thank you for posting .

Its a new area for us .. have done Naples , most of the Gulf Coast and the Keys so thought we would have a change it looks very laid back .

I haven't fished in years & not sure if DH ever has but it does still hold a fascination for me especially sea fishing.

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We are going sea fishing tomorrow. I will do a report on it for you to see.😁x

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Originally Posted by Bee happy

Looks lovely,villa looks amazing. Where did you book it ? Have a fab time

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We booked through Homeaway.

[Carpgirl]

We are in a Marco Island villa too right now. Gorgeous, but quite a bit more expensive than Orlando ones.

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Originally Posted by Carpgirl

We are in a Marco Island villa too right now. Gorgeous, but quite a bit more expensive than Orlando ones.

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Yes it was expensive but it really is beautiful. We are in Bald Eagle Drive. X

[spenners]

Villa looks stunning 😍