Friends Visit Us On The Boat

Moving all the way down to Florida and being away from Rockford, Pam was really afraid that she would be lonely and miss her friends. Thankfully we had enough guests and friends come and see us that it made the winter fly by.

Our renaming group. Thanks for sharing this with us!

When we finally got the boat to the Fort Myers City Yacht Basin. We were met by our friends Mark and Becky Mather (right side of the picture). It turned out that they were in the slip right next to us. Marc and Michele McCoy came over from Sanibel Island to conduct the Official Boat Renaming Ceremony along with Mike and Sandy Ernsdorff.

We love how Mike and Sandy are right at home on the boat!

We were lucky enough to have Mike and Sandy Ernsdorff stay with us for a little over 2 weeks (split between the condo and then on the boat).  It was great to have friends to help us get acclimated to the boat and Florida.  We wish that they would have stayed longer.

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Sandy and Pam were hunting for the best Pina Colaodas.

We went to some great restaurants, had some good happy hours watching sunsets and had an awesome time with our wonderful friends.

In early February, we were visited by our Scuba diving buddies, John and Darla Saxby, from Sun Prairie, Wis.   They were in Bonita Springs visiting her niece and stayed with us one night.   While they were here, we visited the Lee County Manatee Park.  We were glad that they came by to see us.  It was great to see them again.

Here is Darla with her buddy.

We had to get into the pictures as well.

Gayle and Dale Haab from Roscoe (a friend of Pam’s from the health club in Roscoe) were up on a family holiday in Anna Maria island and drove over 2 hours to come and spend the night with us.  While they were here we visited  Thomas Edison’s Winter Estate and eat at Pincher’s Restaurant.

John’s brother Jamie and his wife Ronda drove their RV down to Bonita Springs.  They came over to Fort Myers to check out the boat.

Friends from Frentress Marina, Jan and Kent Syverson, stayed with us for almost a week.  These two are starting the Great Loop in the Fall and they wanted to come to Fort Myers and check out some of the Marinas that they would like to stay at next winter.  While they were here, we put them to work.  Jan hemmed curtains (by hand) and Kent assisted John with some of the electronics that he was putting on the boat.  Later Jan sent me some place mats and a table runner that she made for the boat. She also fixed some window covers that were starting to show their age. We really enjoyed sharing time with them and appreciated all that they did.  We look forward to catching up with them next year in Fort Myers when both of our boats will be there.

We invited some gold loopers that were at the Yacht Basin over for docktails one night and Jan and Kent got some good advice on what to expect for their Great Loop adventure.

Some old  friends, Mike and Cindy Hulsebus, popped over and stayed over night in the middle of March.  They were going to a gathering of Abbey Springs friends down in Naples after spending the winter by Jensen Beach.  We hadn’t seen them for so long and it was a treat to catch up with them, even if the stay was too short.

In the later part of March, we got an unexpected call from some friends from Frentress Marina.  Doug, Julie and Emily Roe were in Florida on a cruise and after the cruise they weren’t leaving right away so they rented a car and came all the way over to visit us for the day.  We were so excited to see these 3.  We must have walked 3 miles as we walked over to Pincher’s for lunch.  Their stay was short but very sweet. Hopefully we will see Roe Boat doing the loop someday.

Quite the group hanging out on the back of the boat. So good to see them.

Just before we left Fort Myers our former Roscoe neighbor Denny reminded us that Steve and Lenny Saunders, who used to live in Rockford, had moved down to the Fort Myers.  We were so happy to get together for a dinner at the Firestone.  We look forward to seeing them when we get back to Fort Myers next winter.

All in all we enjoyed our time with our friends that came to see us and were excited to show them our new boat.  We will be in Fort Myers again next winter and hope to see many more friends.