Back in the old days, teachers’ first assignment for their students was to have them write “What I Did Last Summer.” Summers for me since 2003 have been filled with guiding tours, teaching sailing and kayaking, and being a general beach bum at Coastal Kayak.
Now, Jen and Mitch want me to share “What I Did This Winter.” Being older (and wiser) than fellow guide Tim Bennett, I didn’t launch my kayak in an area that required dodging ice floes and icebergs. I know what happened to RMS Titanic.
Instead, my wife and I loaded kayaks, bicycles, fishing rods, the Harley and other assorted toys into our fifth-wheel toy hauler and headed to snow-free Florida for a couple of months.
The highlights: kayaking with dolphin and alligators, bicycling the 20-mile roundtrip Legacy Trail between Sarasota and Venice Beach, catching enough saltwater fish for several good dinners, and joining roughly 500,000 of my closest friends in Daytona for Bike Week.
Best of all, no snow. However, we did come back a little too soon and had to pull on our boots, heavy gloves and coats, and pull out the shovels to clear our driveway of the March 16-17 snow. That’s it, right? The last storm of the season? Right?
See you on the water.
— “Cap’n Bob”