The air and the pool deck were blistering hot. I got in the water often. Maddy had forgotten a towel and had not put on sunscreen. I offered her what little I had and worried about her burning. But she is 17 now. : ( She said she didn't need a towel. She went to investigate the other pool. When she didn't return for a long time, I thought about checking on her. Then I thought, maybe she wants to be alone. She had a room key so I packed up and went upstairs. Later I will write about our dinner in Ft. Lauderdale by the Sea.
Cara - Friday was a gorgeous day. Kelly and Maddy opted out of the beach so Susan, Gabby, Darcy and I packed up our beach bags and headed out. We could have taken the beach shuttle from our resort to the resort on the beach, but Lizbeth had told me I could park at the beach resort myself and the shuttle returned too early for us. My nephew, Jason, had told us it was very easy to get to the beach and he gave us directions which I remembered as; turn right on Powerline, right on Atlantic and it takes you to the beach where you turn right and go all the way down and the resort is on your right. Susan remembered some directions, but not really. Neither one of us was concerned and off we went. Either Jason gave us the wrong directions or we heard the directions wrong or we exited our resort in a different way from Jason because we headed out in the wrong direction. After driving for far too long we consulted Siri on our phones who wanted us to turn around and get on the interstate from where we were. We followed her directions, but as we came up the ramp it was stand still traffic on 95. I got off on the next exit to avoid that mess and we found our way by backtracking. We should have turned left on Powerline and then followed the rest of Jason's directions except the one where the resort was on the right. It was on the left. We were about thirty minutes later than we should have been, but Susan and I were proud of ourselves for not panicking or yelling, instead keeping our cool and figuring out how to get to our destination.
We parked at the Wyndham Royal Vista, a place I tried to book us into originally, but it was full, and we walked through the lobby, past the pools (one of which was closed), and out on to the beach. The Vista had a nice rental place where we could slap down cash for snorkels, jet skies, kayaks, boats, time on the water trampoline, umbrellas, and chairs. Susan got us an umbrella and two lounge chairs, and an aged, permanently bronzed cabana man took us to our set up...directly behind my nephew and family. "You following us," Jason asked, laughing. "Stalking you!" I replied. We all hugged the rest of the family, sprayed on the sunscreen, and while Susan and Jason's wife Brandy sunbathed together, the rest of us went into the water.
The water was beautiful. My first thought as I waded out was how clear and clean the water was and then my second thought was shuffling. In our area on the gulf side we must shuffle in the summer when heading out into the water because it is stingray season. They hide under the sand close to shore, and while they aren't aggressive, they don't like being stepped on and will lash out with their stingers. I looked down as I walked, but all I saw were small fish swimming away as I lifted each foot. The water was flat, no waves, and I realized that this wasn't the gulf, but the Atlantic and where the hell were the waves? Every time I'm on the Atlantic side we spend hours riding the waves. Not this time. The water was as flat as the gulf. The temperature was perfect and it was so refreshing that I never wanted to get out. Even Susan went into the water and I don't think, in all the times I've vacationed with her on beaches, that she has ever done that. She got in twice!
Jason and company had rafts and balls and the cousins played and played in the water. Jason and I floated for hours talking, and occasionally Brandy and Susan would come out and join us. The only down side was the little nipping fish that would taste us as we stood. We swam, sunbathed, sipped drinks from the tiki bar, ate lunch from the Vista grill, and swam some more. We stayed until five o'clock and then agreed that we should all go to dinner together. On the way back to our car Susan and I stopped at the front desk and asked the helpful, friendly (take note Palm-aire) clerk where to dine. She gave us two places and enthusiastically told us all about them once she found out our preferences. Armed with that knowledge, we made our way back to our resort to join the others.
Everyone showered and we followed Jason and family to Lauderdale by the Sea, a small town with beach apartments, bars, restaurants, and tourist shops. Animals were allowed in the restaurants and there was a lot of oohing and aahing over the dogs we ran into. I decided it was definitely how guys picked up chicks in this town.
One of the restaurants the clerk had recommended was called Mulligan's Beach House and it had just opened a month or so ago. They could take us right away, it was now 8 in the evening and very crowded, and we sat at a table for ten outside, but under a roof, almost in a little enclave just for us. We drank $5.00 long island iced teas and sampled firecracker shrimp and calamari while we talked and talked. The adults enjoyed their meals. Susan and I had mango salsa mahi mahi and Kelly had more firecracker shrimp. Jason and Brandi had seafood pasta. The kids had odd things like flatbread, chicken fingers, and sandwiches. My kids, born and raised by the gulf, don't eat seafood. Go figure.
We finished up the evening with a stroll and the best ice cream, toasted coconut, that I have ever had (next to G.D. Ritzey's O-O-Oreo). It was a nice evening.
Kelly - Dinner in Lauderdale by the sea was very good. The waitress at Mulligan's was a no-nonsense, bleach blonde, middle-aged lady named Jennifer who managed ten people's orders and spoke loud enough that even the deaf people could hear over the roar of the traffic, crowds, and bar music. The firecracker shrimp was tasty. My crabby flatbread was okay. The pina colada was delicious. After dinner, it had started raining and we huddled under an umbrella by a beautiful light-up tree to take a group photo. I shook the umbrella by accident and little waterfalls of water fell down on all sides of the umbrella. The umbrella obviously collected rainwater on top. I found it so funny (it could have been the long island iced tea) that I couldn't resist doing it again. I shook the umbrella and water fell again. Shake. Waterfall. Shake. Waterfall. Brandy had this look on her face like, "Oh no!" Apparently I was sloshing water on another couple and on the waitstaff/maitre d . Sorry!
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