Hoosier Hospitality in Sarasota

Sarasota, FL      High:  75   Low:  60

After catching up, cleaning up our Christmas decorations and getting our breaths back from a busy week, we headed over to Lido Beach to check it out. It was a very narrow beach, not a whole lot of sand and there were lots of people there since it was a holiday week.

The less crowded end

We stayed briefly...long enough for Sparky to check out an entire crab washed up on the beach, something she had seen only once or twice before, and decide that the beach was not as pretty as others we have seen in the area. It was just your typical touristy beach, not as amazing as Siesta Key Beach.

Then we headed over to Sarasota Park. Sparky heard steel drums! It sounded like it was coming from O'Leary's Tiki Bar nearby. We HAD to check that out. Sparky LOVES steel drums, Eldo does, too....It turns out that on Tuesdays and Sundays, Frankie Catalina plays steel drums at the beach bar. So we stopped for a beer for Eldo and a strawberry margarita for Sparky and listened to Frankie play for awhile. He was very good! He plays at O'Leary's on Sundays and Tuesday nights. And on Friday nights, there's a great reggae band. O-o-o-o-h, we're gonna have to check that out!

At a table in front of us, were three ladies and a guy, all who were wearing IU tee shirts and sweatshirts. Sparky graduated with a B.S. and a M.S. from IU, so she says to Eldy, "I'm gonna say hi to them before we leave." They proceeded to exchange pleasantries with the neighbors across from them, and Sparky heard them confirm they were from Indiana. Sparky gave them a shout out--"Yay! Fellow Hoosiers!" and they laughed, so we ended up talking briefly from across the tables. Sparky told one of the gals she loved her IU tee shirt, it was one of the coolest I.U. basketball shirts Sparky had seen. 

As they got up to leave, the gals came over to our table, and darned if the lady with the cool basketball shirt hadn't taken it off, (she had on another shirt underneath.) She handed the basketball jersey to Sparky. She says, "Here, I want you to have this. Wash it, wear it, and enjoy! I'll get another one at next week's basketball game."  "WOW! ARE YOU KIDDING ME? REALLY???"  Sparky was FLABBERGASTED. Sparky never bought herself a tee shirt or sweatshirt while she was at I.U., not sure why, but she didn't own a single I.U. item. She had just gotten done telling Eldy she regretted never having something from I.U like a shirt or sweatshirt and here the lady gives her the shirt off her back! What a wonderful gesture! There was no way that they could have heard that comment, they were sitting too far away. They left before we could think about getting a photo with them......But here's the shirt! Now Sparky finally has an I.U. shirt, forty years later!  Makes you want to pay it forward...Now that's Hoosier hospitality at its best! Sparky will definitely look for an opportunity to do something nice for someone in the near future.

We enjoyed our little exploratory visit to Lido Beach and O'Leary's Tiki Bar and Grill today....

See you tomorrow......

Beach Bums

(Who, me? says E.) Yes, you! And Sparky, and Nick and Ritchie--we were all beach bums for the day at the Lido Key Beach today. Kelly and I checked it out when we did our excursion to the St. Armand Circle in Sarasota yesterday. We thought it looked wonderful! She is now back home, hard at work...It was a wonderful visit and too short of a vacation for her!

Lido Key Beach is about a 30 minute drive from the Manatee RV Park in Bradenton in good traffic. We had to go in two cars because Eldo and Sparky had more junk to take to the beach than a family with kids....Beach mats, beach chairs, cabana, towels, picnic lunch, cooler, magazines, tote bags, you name it, we had it! But first, we had to set up the cabana, which is Sparky's baby. For some reason, if there are people watching, it takes her twice as long to set it up!

But we got it.

It was an extremely hot, intense sun kind of a day at the beach today. At first, the water was totally calm.

It was 74 degrees!  We dunked ourselves repeatedly to stay cool......We ate our picnic lunches...We people watched...the guys were on bikini/thong watch...Not too many of those today even with the crowds at the beach.  Later, the wind picked up and we got some mini waves.

It was our last day to visit with Nick and Ritchie...Tomorrow, they head towards home which is Grand Rapids, and we head to Wachula, FL for a few days.....We'll really miss them, they are wonderful people and friends to treasure.

On the way home, we saw the "Colossal Kissers" or as some Sarasotans call it, "The Big Smooch".....It's about a 20 foot high statue designed to withstand a force 3 hurricane. Apparently, the statue used to be in San Diego and now it's here...Residents either hate it or love it...Interesting, at any rate!

If you ever get a chance to look around the St. Armand Circle, not too far from the Mote Aquarium and the Lido Key Beach off the St. Armand Circle, it's a very cool area-- tons of restaurant cafes, cool boutiques and a unique quadrant layout around a roundy round...one of those roundabouts that send you off in different directions.

We had a fun day at the beach today...Best wishes to Nick and Ritchie as they make their way home for a few weeks. They have a trip planned to Alaska. Wish we were going with them!