Captiva Island

Captiva was a place I traveled to with the O'Connells and family several times as a teenager. It holds so many memories: swimming in the pool (for probably hours every single day), orange crunch cake (which Trudy, the master baker, replicated for years to come), sneaking out at 16 with Amy for my first kiss with that country boy from Missouri, Jordan Propst, skimboarding with Matt and Harris (and getting absolutely scraped up by shells), step bump bumping with Amy down the beach, and all sorts of other shenanigans. If Blogger had existed back then, I would've had plenty to say about those trips.

After years of talking about revisiting this special place, Dad made it happen with a weekend trip with the fam. What a bizarre experience revisiting a place with so many distinct memories. The colorful restaurants were all still there, along with the gravel roads, seashell driveways, and palm trees galore... just as wonderfully tropical as I remembered.

The first day (after my redeye flight), it was particularly nice sitting on the porch with Mom and Pops, enjoying the breeze and views. Chris, Liesl, the nieces, Matt, and Rachel got in late that night. The next several days were filled with finding awesome shells thanks to the storm. Hurricane Isaias was heading up toward the Panhandle one of the days, so we, in very appropriate Florida fashion, had the catastrophizing Weather Channel on all day, laughing at the ridiculous newscasters in their helmets and glasses trying not to fly away in the "record-breaking" winds.

On our last afternoon, Chris and I ventured out (with Dad having to turn back due to the strong winds and currents) to paddle out. I was, for some reason, set on taking a stand-up paddleboard out for Adaleigh and me, despite the visibly tough waters and wind ahead. So we suffered and pushed through a short little stretch, paddling toward a newly determined goal (not very far ahead, just to at least reach a speed limit sign or something), expecting to turn back and give up. But Chris decided to tie us up to his kayak and pull us (while we still offered our paddling efforts) so that we could make it to this epic mangrove adventure. We had three little cormorants join us along the paddle to this island, diving from one side of our kayaks to the next, swallowing little fish whole. Once we got to the mangroves, they exceeded our expectations. We ducked, dodged, and crashed into branches, got stuck under a few, and got spooked by tree crabs (at first suspected as giant tree spiders for a moment)... It was great.

Other highlights included the Green Flash, a waterfront restaurant, to officially celebrate Mom and Dad's 50th wedding anniversary. We, of course, had to visit the Bubble Room and RC Otter, eat orange crunch cake, and make multiple trips to The Mucky Duck. I hadn't swum in a pool this much in years, and it was a blast. Marco Polo and Sharks and Minnows were much enjoyed, especially with Chris's silly version of Marco Polo on the boogie board.

I was very grateful I pushed back my flight to spend one more fun afternoon and night with the fam.

freaking fighting the wind and waves here.

Thanks to Matt and Rachel for taking on the "make the shells into a 50" command and Adaleigh's young techn wizardry skills, we made this silly anniveary pic....