Trip Summaries!

 I have to apologize once again for not posting updates, so I will make this a  summary. I spend 3 days a week or so at the Community House helping out, cleaning/sorting shells for crafting/selling.  Sanibel is improving daily, but much work is yet to be done, everywhere there is someone doing just that! 

I have however been out on beach walks the last 3 days! The tides are super low, super early in the morning...but you know me, I'm out there!! ;)

Saturday, I went solo, another public beach opened at Gulfside....one of my favorites! The beach has completely changed since Hurricane Ian made his appearance, it has always been a pretty flat beach, this time it was a sloped beach which makes it a little more difficult to walk and see into the water. I'm still leary of getting in the water, I wear scuba boots, and tend to stay pretty shallow! They've done a great job of cleaning up and providing a nice path to the beach from the parking lot....but it is very different and not all the paths are open yet due to the beach being washed away....

The beach looks great, and as usual the sunrises are still amazing!

   

There was signs of life...like this big Florida Horse Conch!!!

...and the dolphin were playing in the Gulf...

I didn't find much, but I did find a few keepers...

This Alphabet Cone (Score!!) and a nice Lightning Whelk...which I find hard to resist even though I have so many!

Pretty quickly after that I found ANOTHER Alphie!!

....and ANOTHER, with this beautiful Juvenile Horse Conch! These 2 are some of my very favorites! The color on that horse conch is a beautiful orange...it will clean up very nicely! We call them a Pony at this size....Perfect!!

This pen shell says it all....had to snap a pic!

Sunday, I went with Teresa & Lynne, Teresa says she hasn't been on a beach walk in the dark in years, and we all three throughly enjoyed the day!

My very first find, as soon as we walked onto the beach!!! A Beautiful Alphabet!!

Lynne immediately noticed the 'knobs' of a be Horse Conch sticking up in the sand....and begin to dig it out...

But alas...it was in bad shape....

I found a small one sticking out.....

Yay!! it was empty and in tact!

Lynne...or was it Teresa...? found this beauty...check out that beautiful color, it went home in one of their bags!

Teresa was finding quite a few Apple Murex ....

One of them also found this BEAUTIFUL True Tulip!

I found some 'knobs' sticking up....I hope...I hope....

Nope...it was also in bad shape....

I did also find a pretty little True Tulip....

and a pretty nice Lightning Whelk...

and another Alphabet Cone!!

and Teresa and I both spotted this Alphie at the same time!! (sorry for the out-of- focus Pic!)

We saw lots of Live, Banded and True Tulips, Cockles and Fighting Conchs up on the sand bar, which is always nice to see! 

There was also a little Hanky Panky going on with these two Horse Conchs...

Something we found to be a little strange were Pelicans hanging out on the beach with these Terns and Seagulls....they don't normally stand on the beach in a crowd like this....

We had a great time getting some beach therapy and seeing lots of life on the beach, and just chit chatting about any and everything! Lynne left with at least 4 bags of shells she collected for the Community House!! I did pretty well myself....good times, and treasures too!

This morning I went solo again...(I gotta go when the tides are low!!)

I walked a long time along the gulf, and found little to nothing for quite a while....then low and behold, in a favorite tidal pool...this beauty was just laying there looking all ready to go home with me!

He'll need some cleaning up, but it has a good point on the top, and should look great after a little TLC!!

Not far up the beach I found this beauty soaking in the tidal pool sticking up out of the sand about half way!

I also started finding some nice Sharks eyes and some smaller Lightning Whelks that I couldn't resist....again...for some reason I didn't remember to snap a pic!! By now, the sun started up and was adding light and a little bit of warmth to this chilly & windy 50 degree morning...

My back pack was feeling pretty heavy, which was just fine....and then I spotted this beauty, the edge just barely sticking out of the sand... Look at that beautiful color on that inside edge!!!

I also found this beautiful True Tulip....

and then another....alongside this worm shell...

The morning was a complete success, and my back pack weighed a ton...I ended up with 4 biggies & I didn't get over to the Community House to go to work until almost 9:00....but oh was it fun!! Here's the final count for the day! I'll have to post the big guys after they are all cleaned up!!!

Tomorrow....Keewaydin trip with Jolene and Cindy...

Stay Tuned!!

::Shelllady Hugs::

Bag Lady Night

We decided to try our luck again last night, so Team Cheri headed out on another adventure. It was obvious pretty quickly that the shelling was not going to be as it had been the night before.....Pretty colors that we can't resist picking up....Scallops...

Olives, Tiny Horse Conchs....

I even found a first for me....Cheri called it when she saw it, and I looked it up...it's called a Beautiful Crassatella...

It's hard to tell in the picture, but the point closest to my rings is a vivid orange...
Here are a couple of better pics in the daylight...

We decided to head back to Gulfside, still a few hours before the low, but still a nice walk....Once again we were greeted by a Cane Toad....these guys are so Huge....I thought at first it was a Rabbit!!

We walked past him, giving him his space (after his photo shoot) and headed to the beach, Cheri very quickly found an Alphie (Alphabet Cone)...not perfect, but good enough for me!! 

We walked a long way, and saw very little....even those Millions of Dosinia that were there the night before were gone!  She did find a Huge Horse Conch buried....

We left him for the next 'Avid Sheller'! ;)

I found, what we call a Pony, a middle sized Horse Conch....with some nice color...

....and we found some Horse Conch Egg casings, that appeared to be empty!

 That's great because it means that hopefully they will grow up and we will be on our way back from the awful Red Tide last summer! BTW, I wanted to mention that the water by the causeway has been a beautiful blue everytime I've gone across it these last two weeks....such a welcome change, I hope it stays that way!

Ok...Back to the beachwalk...

Cheri Found a Big Horse Conch that she decided to keep....though its covered with tons of barnacles....

The color and the tip look really good....so this will be her project for a while!!


Further down the beach we started noticing trash and toys spread all over the place....funny, we had just mentioned that it had gotten better....

well that thought was very quickly over!!  We gathered up at least 6 Beer cans, cups, straws, plastic bags, wrappers ....and lots of toys scattered everywhere...mostly broken.

Cheri stuffed what she could in her backpack, I carried a bag full, she had a bag of trash and was dragging the boogie board.....couldn't believe the mess! I wish I had taken a picture of us walking back....remember, she already had a huge Horse Conch she was carrying! We had to put something down if we saw a shell we wanted! Cheri got pretty good at picking up stuff with her toes out of the water!!

I don't have a lot of pictures because my camera battery died, most of the pics were taken by Cheri with her phone. On the way back, we hit a 'Honey Hole'. The sand was very soft, almost like quicksand, if you stood there you would sink to your ankle....and she spotted this BEAUTIFUL Alphie!....

See anything else there? We both dropped our bags and toys and decided to take our time and check this all out....

She also found this Banded Tulip....that we think is not a standard one from here....the markings are so distinct...

and it's even a bit heavier than a standard Banded....

Here are the ones shells she kept for the night...

A couple of Big Dark Olives, that beautiful Alphie, the Banded and a HUGE Shark's Eye!

I kept a few more! ;)

Oh, I almost forgot! I got an Alphie too!! :)

As usual, we had a GREAT time! Hopefully more to come!

Stay Tuned!

::Shelllady Hugs::