Cape Coral !

[ChrisS]

As CCF and I know, Pine Island is beautiful, our 6 months of peace personified winter... we no longer go to the Key's, we have it all here. If you do nip along to Bokeelia Pier you can sit at Capt Con's Fish House for a meal or drink and look across the water. You know you're there as that's where the road ends!

Our favourite 'access allowed' pier is owned by the Randall family, close by Tarpon Lodge restaurant and the indian mounds at Pineland. Below is a photo taken from that pier. We're very lucky as our home is inbetween Pineland and Bokeelia Pier, 2 mile to both. We often head out into Pine Island Sound/Charlotte Harbor for a boat ride... dolphins in abundance, and during late summer/early spring many manatee. A friend and I got out of the boat in April to join them in their water, we didn't interfere with them in any way, just shared their water. Here's Capt Bruce's details swfloridaprivategetaway/
he charges $50pp (minmum of 4), which is an excellent price, circa 6 hours out on the water, he advises you take food/drinks in a cooler. Take camera and binocs. He'll take you shelling on Upper Captiva beach, which is only accessible by boat, if you time it right you can shell and have a sunset cruise, whatever you wish. He is as thrilled as his guests onboard his 21' double bimini pontoon when the dolphins play around. He asks you where you want to go, trust me, leave it to him, sit back and enjoy.

Matlacha (pronounce Mat-la-chay) is very quaint and well worth a visit, the ordnance only allow island buildings to be 30 foot high, so no skyscrappers et al. The business/art galleries in Matlacha are all brightly pastel colours. Wild Child is a huge Beatles fan and most of her artwork revolves around them. She has a fabulous garden out back you can go to, blue glass bottle designs all over, in the ground, on the walls... there are swing seats in the gazebo for you to sit and chill for a while, and time dependant free coffee is available.

Also, check out this website for live cams of Pine Island, including Bokeelia Pier, Pineland Marina, Tarpon Lodge... Burnt Store (about 7 mile further on from PI), Cape Coral, Fort Myers Matanza Pass, Gasparilla, Sanibel - look on the left side of the page for all the live cam links. Each night we watch Bokeelia Pier and Sea Tow at Burnt Store Marina live cam for brilliant sunsets:
capeweather/webcam.html

I could write pages and pages about this magnificent area!

Randal Pier, Pineland

Our 5 day a week fix... Pine Island public, salt water, heated pool to around 86c... sigh, be in there Tues 22nd Nov, bring it on

Here's further photo's of the area

Sunset over Matlacha Pass, shrimp boat in the foreground

Matlacha sunset

Matlacha

St James City (south of the island), Galt Preserve

St James City - day and sunset photo's

Onboard Capt Bruce's boat

Capt Bruce

[Mr Tom Morrow]

Chris. Stunning pictures, well done for posting as they are awesome.

[mum of two]

Those pics are magnificent, thank you for posting, also thanks to everyone for all the tips & recommendations.

[COL41]

So glad we are going to Cape Coral having read about all the amazing places to visit nearby, and looking at those fantastic photos.

[barnyard]

Originally Posted by ChrisS

As CCF and I know, Pine Island is beautiful, our 6 months of peace personified winter... we no longer go to the Key's, we have it all here. If you do nip along to Bokeelia Pier you can sit at Capt Con's Fish House for a meal or drink and look across the water. You know you're there as that's where the road ends!

Our favourite 'access allowed' pier is owned by the Randall family, close by Tarpon Lodge restaurant and the indian mounds at Pineland. Below is a photo taken from that pier. We're very lucky as our home is inbetween Pineland and Bokeelia Pier, 2 mile to both. We often head out into Pine Island Sound/Charlotte Harbor for a boat ride... dolphins in abundance, and during late summer/early spring many manatee. A friend and I got out of the boat in April to join them in their water, we didn't interfere with them in any way, just shared their water. Here's Capt Bruce's details swfloridaprivategetaway/
he charges $50pp (minmum of 4), which is an excellent price, circa 6 hours out on the water, he advises you take food/drinks in a cooler. Take camera and binocs. He'll take you shelling on Upper Captiva beach, which is only accessible by boat, if you time it right you can shell and have a sunset cruise, whatever you wish. He is as thrilled as his guests onboard his 21' double bimini pontoon when the dolphins play around. He asks you where you want to go, trust me, leave it to him, sit back and enjoy.

Matlacha (pronounce Mat-la-chay) is very quaint and well worth a visit, the ordnance only allow island buildings to be 30 foot high, so no skyscrappers et al. The business/art galleries in Matlacha are all brightly pastel colours. Wild Child is a huge Beatles fan and most of her artwork revolves around them. She has a fabulous garden out back you can go to, blue glass bottle designs all over, in the ground, on the walls... there are swing seats in the gazebo for you to sit and chill for a while, and time dependant free coffee is available.

Also, check out this website for live cams of Pine Island, including Bokeelia Pier, Pineland Marina, Tarpon Lodge... Burnt Store (about 7 mile further on from PI), Cape Coral, Fort Myers Matanza Pass, Gasparilla, Sanibel - look on the left side of the page for all the live cam links. Each night we watch Bokeelia Pier and Sea Tow at Burnt Store Marina live cam for brilliant sunsets:
capeweather/webcam.html

I could write pages and pages about this magnificent area!

Randal Pier, Pineland

Our 5 day a week fix... Pine Island public, salt water, heated pool to around 86c... sigh, be in there Tues 22nd Nov, bring it on

Here's further photo's of the area

Sunset over Matlacha Pass, shrimp boat in the foreground

Matlacha sunset

Matlacha

St James City (south of the island), Galt Preserve

St James City - day and sunset photo's

Onboard Capt Bruce's boat

Capt Bruce

See more...

Brilliant thanks for all this.. cannot wait looks beautiful!

[ChrisS]

Cape Coral is a totally different area to Orlando, with the exception of Sunsplash there are no theme parks, it's quieter and more chilled. You may also find shopping is cheaper, especially at the highly rated Miromar Outlets on the I-75.

I admit I do smile when I see threads asking/suggesting/wondering why people don't visit other countries... all our needs are amply taken care of on Pine Island.

By the way, the public pool I mentioned, costs $24pp for our 6 month membership, for the amount of visits we make it equates to circa 20c per visit. I make sarny's, take drinks in the cool box, our Nooks to read, in and out the water... bliss. Fab pool, hot walk in showers in the changing rooms, excellent life guard staff, plus they throw cook out's twice whilst we're there... they supply the meat, rolls, condiments, soft drinks, water, coffee, crisps, cake/biscuits et al... each member takes a dish to share and pay $2 per head, the amount of food laid out on 6 tressel tables is incredible as there's usually 70 or so members at these cook out's.

We never tire of our winters on Bokeelia.

[Hank]

Thank you Chris

Lovely pictures and a great report which give an insight to what this part of the Gulf Coast has to offer.

Hank

[smithlane]

Originally Posted by ChrisS

Cape Coral is a totally different area to Orlando, with the exception of Sunsplash there are no theme parks, it's quieter and more chilled. You may also find shopping is cheaper, especially at the highly rated Miromar Outlets on the I-75.

I admit I do smile when I see threads asking/suggesting/wondering why people don't visit other countries... all our needs are amply taken care of on Pine Island.

By the way, the public pool I mentioned, costs $24pp for our 6 month membership, for the amount of visits we make it equates to circa 20c per visit. I make sarny's, take drinks in the cool box, our Nooks to read, in and out the water... bliss. Fab pool, hot walk in showers in the changing rooms, excellent life guard staff, plus they throw cook out's twice whilst we're there... they supply the meat, rolls, condiments, soft drinks, water, coffee, crisps, cake/biscuits et al... each member takes a dish to share and pay $2 per head, the amount of food laid out on 6 tressel tables is incredible as there's usually 70 or so members at these cook out's.

We never tire of our winters on Bokeelia.

See more...

We are staying in Cape Coral in 2018 and would love to visit Pine Island, how long roughly does it take to drive there? I've put it in Google maps but says 1hr 6 mins which surely can't be right as they look very close to one another?!

[Guest]

It does depend on where in Cape Coral you are staying but using Veterans Memorial Pkwy/Veterans Pkwy it takes 30 minutes.

Rotonda Girl

[capecoralfl]

Yes, Rotonda Girl is correct, the Cape is big so it depends where you are staying. It is as easy and quick for us to get to Sanibel from our villa as it is to get to Pine Island, but we are nearer the causeways over to Ft Myers rather than in the north of the Cape.
We like the bigger choice of restaurants, beaches and quirky shops over in Sanibel & Captiva and head there a lot - but there is something for everyone.