Now we are four

In a rather spur-of-the-moment decision, a few weeks ago we decided to take a vacation and we booked a trip to Florida. We randomly selected the South Seas Resort on Captiva Island, in part because there was a direct flight from Montreal to Fort Myers (35 miles away). Amelia had a blast on her first flight. We ended up buying her a seat and brought along the car seat, which worked out well. It was much easier to keep her entertained when she had her own seat. The woman seated ahead of us on the flight down had three kids (9 years, 2 years and 6 months) and her two-year old was very fidgety throughout the flight. She asked us if we did anything special to be able to bring the car seat on board and I said no, so I noticed that on the way back she brought the seat for her two-year old who was much less fussy.

Amelia did great on the afternoon flight there. Although we weren’t allowed to bring any carry-on bags they did let us bring a diaper bag so I stuffed it as full as possible with toys and books. We also brought the stroller as “gate check” baggage although we probably could have managed the airports just fine without it. We were worried about the supposed delays because of heightened security but it was quite quick in the end.

Captiva is beautiful. The resort/hotel was great because it was somewhat secluded. We had a two-bedroom “beach-side” villa, which essentially meant a condo with a cleaning service. Each section of the resort had its own pool, so there was a small one about 25 metres from our deck. The ocean was another 25 or so metres down the boardwalk. It was perfect because both the beach and the pool were empty the whole week. And we had great weather (for Florida in January).

On the one rainy morning, we drove into Naples and went to the Naples Zoo/Botanical Gardens. It was the ideal zoo for Amelia. She walked around the whole thing by herself. They had bears and lions and tigers and zebras and monkeys and a couple of other more exotic fare. Because the zoo is situated in a botanical garden, it seemed slightly less off-putting than a zoo would normally be (to me, at least). They also had a couple of playgrounds situated at intervals on the main path and Amelia took full advantage of them.

The resort had a trolley system set up so you could get from one section to the other without having to drive your car. We visited the more “touristy” section a couple of times where they had the golf course and several bigger swimming pools, a harbour, a nature center and other family/kid-friendly activities. But, we mostly spent time on the beach, digging sand castles, watching the birds, collecting shells and playing in the waves.

I’m going to post the photos to Picasa since we have so many of them. Link to follow.