June 5th - Marco Island

On our way down to Marco Island, we stopped in Ft. Myers to visit Thomas Edison’s winter home. When we got there we found that Thomas Edison and Henry Ford had a joint winter homes estate. They were working together to develop a domestic alternative source of rubber. They experimented with planting trees from the Amazon to see if they could develop rubber. Some of the trees are still standing. 

                                                Ficus/Banyan tree planted by Edison

Our destination for the day was Marco Island. Marco Island was recommended by several friends who said that the island had beautiful white sand beaches. When we got out onto the beach we found that this just was not the case.  The beach frontage is long. There is quite a distance from the hotels to the water. But you have to walk across crushed shells. The beach is covered in broken shells, sharp broken shells. Most people walked on the beach with their shoes on. Rob and I went for a 4 mile walk and I spent most of my time trying to sidestep the broken shells so I wouldn't hurt my feet. (I didn't have my shoes because I was going to walk on the beach). In addition, the water was a dull brownish green. 

We just can’t figure out why Marco Island is such a prime destination, since it is very pricey. There are no activities other than the beach which is kind of crappy. There are other places with wide beaches and better water (Miami Beach, Cancun).  Don’t bother visiting Marco Island unless you have young children – they could entertain themselves all day collecting shells.

(We have been checking the weather and we decided to head on down to Key West. The storm seems to be heading northeast across Florida. We’ll see).