Vero Beach & St Augustine – 5/5/17 – 5/13/17 part 2

Sunday 5/7/17
We saw a beautiful sunrise over the ocean, the first of many, and then went shelling. I found the prize of the trip, a shell literally as big as my hand! I promptly handed that over to my lovely bride. We decided to try the park where manatee sightings are common, but were disappointed to find it closed for two weeks. So we went back to the resort to rent bikes for Kathy and me while the kids went down to the beach for a little bit. The CM renting the bikes told us about the tunnel they have under the street to a path. They have a Peter Pan mural and play piped in “You Can Fly!” She said we could be done within about an hour. Maybe her 25-year-young person could, but we’re a fair amount older! An hour and a half later (at least) we drug our tired but happy bodies back to the resort via the tunnel. It was a beautiful route with lots of views of the bay and trail and some neat shells due to light traffic in the area. They have a pond, picnic area, campfire pit, sand volleyball court, basketball courts, and tennis courts, all directly across the street from the main resort area, all for Vero Beach guests! I don’t think we’d ever get bored there.

By now all four of us were starving, the ride having taken longer than we anticipated so we grabbed lunch from the food court and then it was pool time. We found out they were having pool slide races later that afternoon so three of us went down the slide on a few “training runs” just like Olympic bobsled trials! Yes, we take our slide races very seriously. Kathy danced with CM’s on the pool deck to the tunes of a d.j. It was great to see everyone having fun and de-stress from our hectic lives. Finally it was time for the races. I held the lead in the adult male group until the second to last person! I got barely beat out but kept my second place. Silver medal is better than no medal at all! Only the two of us were under 9 seconds!

We were all hungry after an afternoon of swimming and sliding so we got subs from a local place just across the street and ate on our balcony watching the waves. So peaceful. It would not take long to get used to that. We walked the other way than the morning on the beach and explored around the resort. We met a very nice extended family who was renting one of the cottages for the week. I would love to get enough people together and rent one of those, but we would need a lot of people. Those things are expensive! We enjoyed some nighttime glow minigolf before turning in for the night.