... spending the night at Naples FL

Breakfast - I finally went down and grabbed a couple of cups of juice as they were taking things down. We were both still stuffed from yesterday lunch.

We finally check out at close to 11 local.

1st stop is the Purple Onion Deli-Grill in Lakeland a few miles from the hotel. BB wants be to take a right down their street. I can't. They have a 'Farmers Curb' Market' on that street for a few blocks.

So we parked on the next street, walked to the Deli, ordered and then walked through the Farmers Market while we waited for our food. We walked a few blocks but still could not see the end of it. I did buy some juice from one of the vendors in a little white VW bus. Other places had syrup, honey and fudge that we looked at. Besides all the farm produce.

Good food at the Purple Onion, we both had chicken Philly's. A little dry but very good.

From there we got back on US-98, the same road our hotel was on and took that part of the way to Tampa. Much different than taking the freeway every day. Little towns, old houses and farms. Could have gotten a speeding ticket today. We were leaving town on a divided highway and I was already speeding up and there was a cop in the median. The speed limit was still 45 for another mile. I was mostly going with the flow of traffic but they had FL plates and I have CA, who is he going after?

1st stop is Arcadia at Walmart for the restroom, water and pop.

After thinking about it later, I don't think what I 'saw' was what happened in the Walmart parking lot. After we get out of our car, I hear a horn honk and look in that direction. I see someone back into the 'cartcaddy' the use for picking up carts. The employee was on the far side of the cart and didn't get hit (from what I could see.) My 1st thought was the person backing up saw the person, blew their horn and hit them anyways.

Later when I was thinking about it, it was likely someone else that saw what was going to happen and blew their horn. Either way, not good.

Lots of things on this trip looked hauntingly familiar. Tonight I looked it up. Four years ago this week we had picked up a tree truck in Arcadia heading north (through Lakeland.) That is why. It was the 'goat truck.' The tree trucks were all parked in a farmers pasture and the goats came over to see what we were doing.

2nd stop was our hotel - No, we can not check in early. No, no, no. (Later when we do check in, one of the things I have to initial is a line saying that 'IF I am checking in early, I will be charged an extra $50. No thanks)

3rd stop was in Naples at the Race Trac for fuel. $.30 a gallon cheaper than at the freeway exit. Just before the exit it says 'last fuel for 50 miles.' They gotcha.

4th stop was near Carnstown at the Big Cypress Bend Boardwalk. Nothing too exciting. A half mile of boardwalk through foliage that is so thick that you couldn't see anything if there was any wildlife to see. It does give you an idea of what this area was like in places before the roads were here.

When we got back to our car we realized there was a gator in the pond just a few feet right behind our car so we watched it do absolutely nothing for a while. It did close it's eyes for a while.

BB had found this location online and I had looked it up to see where we were going. When I looked at the map I also saw a 'manatee'  place. When we drove to the boardwalk I hadn't seen it so I looked online again. It is a 'sightseeing boat' place.

5th stop was about 10 miles from the boardwalk called Marsh Trail - Ten Thousand Islands NWR. The 10,000 Islands actually what BB had been looking for originally and then realized that 'islands' would be in the water ... in the Gulf of Mexico in this case. So we would not be driving there today. So instead we walked a mainland trail on part of that area. It had the same gator warning signs as most places do down here.

I looked back last night when I wrote up our last walks. We had not taken a walk of over a mile since July.

6th and (almost) final stop is the Comfort Inn and Naples. Once we are checked in we realize that we are one of the few non-1st floor rooms that does not have a balcony. It would have been nice in this weather. Instead we have a full kitchen. Not bad for 'free.' If we were paying cash it would have been $200+ tonight. After we were checked in we looked at a Best Western online $500 a night. We are just a few points short of having enough to get that room. With Choice, where we are, we could stay another 11 nights :)

Final stop is the Cracklin' Jack's a couple of miles from us. There is a Cracker Barrel and Waffle House in our parking lot but we like to try different things when it comes to food.

BB had looked online and told me about most foods. I go with the BBQ chicken. I thought I was getting pulled BBQ but it was intact. BB got 'strawgrass,' fish over pasta. Way to much food but we can't agree to get the same dish so we will have leftovers tomorrow AM for breakfast. Again.

We've had a few people riding in elevators with us this trip. No one seems to be sticking to the '2 person's per elevator' anymore. We take the steps most times but it depends on how much we are carrying.

Load board

US - 282

IA - 102/98

Nothing came off the IA load board today. Maybe they were not open? But with almost 100 trips I would think they would have been open.

LOG like

10:45 - leave Comfort Inn in Lakeland FL

11:15 - Lakeland FL - Purple Onion Deli-Grill

12:45 - Arcadia FL - WalMart

2:30 - Naples FL - Comfort Inn - (no early check-in. Check in is at 4 PM)

2:45 - Naples FL - Race Trac

3:30 - Carnestown FL - Big Cyprus Bend Boardwalk

4:45 - Carnestown FL - Marsh Trail - 10,000 Islands NWR

6:00 - Naples FL - Comfort Inn

6:30 - Naples FL - Cracklin' Jack's