Sarasota Greetings

Having missed the stoppage of all flights out of the UK by a number of hours, I'm feeling very lucky to be relaxing in Sarasota. As it is the end of day five of my holiday I felt I give up the relaxing long enough to get something up on the blog.

I'll skip the shopping bit and just tell you about some of the activities Rose and I have been enjoying.

On Saturday morning we drove to Lido Key and parked on the key immediately over the Ringling bridge. We then walked across the bridge towards Sarasota and back again. In the afternoon we went over to Rose's brother Leon's park home where he lives with his lovely wife Patty. We picked them up and drove to a Mexican restaurant close by. Delicious food but American sizes so R and I had lunch for the next day!
Sunday after mass, we lounged around with the papers and coffee, before going to downtown Sarasota to the Golden Apple Theatre. Before the show, there is a buffet, so everyone is seated at tables eating and drinking. When the buffet is cleared away, the stage is pulled further out and we watch the show from our tables. Funny show, a revue really, called the Andrews Brothers, with songs from world war 2 period.
On the way to the show we had stopped at JC Penney's as Rose had a 20% discount voucher and we both invested in a pair of Skechers exercise trainers. Before breakfast on Monday, to try out our new trainers, we went for a 2.5 mile walk around the golf complex. Spotted two alligators sun bathing - at a good distance from us I'm pleased to report. Later in the morning we were joined by Rose's friend Shelby who lent me her spare bike and the three of us went on a 21 mile bike ride to Casey Key, stopping on the key for a cool drink and a walk by the beach where we spotted four dolphins. On the way back we cycled past beautiful homes of the rich and famous and stopped for a beer. In the evening, Shelby's husband joined us at Rose's and we played this great game called Mexican Train, a game with dominoes up to double fifteen. Got so engrossed, we ordered take away pizza's.
Today we went for a longer walk before breakfast - 3.5 miles, but the rest of the day was lazy. Slept and read on Siesta beach and then floated around in the swimming pool and we're lounging around in our pyjama's and going to eat salmon, asparagus and salad and wash it down with pink champagne.