That’s how people meet and greet you in Florida, and that’s how you meet new people. Everywhere! Open-minded and interested, and often with a business card ready at hand. This is the story of our first, but hopefully not the last “near-paradise-experience” of this Tour the World.
After three enjoyable days and nights in Miami, we managed to get a bargain on an automatic Volvo highline that took us comfortably along the tropical East coast of Florida to Key Largo. The nature turned even more exotic and paradise-like as we approached the Keys, and after two and an half hours drive, we arrived.
At hotel Ramada we enjoyed a huge bedroom with queen bed for only $99! What a catch! The hotel was covered up with all sorts of Halloween-effects, so we felt a bit like being in the kindergarten again. But it was kind of funny though, having ghosts and witches screaming after you as you walked down the halls.
After we had checked in we drove further out on the Key islands. Amazing! You almost feel like driving on the water, the islands are so small that you can clearly see the waves flowing on shore at each side of the road. We had definitely discovered a new paradise! Not far from the Marathon island we stopped the car and went down to Annes Beach. It was early sunset and the colors were orange, red and even purple, the sand was so pure and cream-like and the water so clear and shallow. Bjørn Christian walked straight out for about 100 meters in the shark filled waters, but only got water up to the knees!
When we got back to our hotel-room we made ourselves some Pina Coladas and started to work. A world trip takes a whole lot of planning, organizing, accounting, and blogging to be on track.
“And then there was Couchsurfing…”
The plan was originally to go to the Caribbean island of Aruba, which supposedly goes free of hurricanes and all the rain during rainy season. But not his time! Not only had a hurricane hit Aruba for the first time in 30 years, just two weeks before we planned to go there, but it had also been raining continuously there since we got to the US, just like the rest of the Caribbean. So why pay a lot of money to be stuck on an island where the only alternative to water activities is gambling, when you can discover the sunshine state of Florida, with all its tropical wonders and welcoming people? We decided to stay! So the plan next was now, after discovering the Key Islands, to drive through the Everglades – the national park in the southwestern Florida, and to find a nice place for diving. Marc had recommended the Sanibel islands on Floridas West coast. And Marc’s recommendations are always good. So we checked out the local diving centers, and booked our class at the “Seahorse”. But where should we stay without paying a fortune?
After Ivar’s warm recommendation, we have be interested in Couchsurfing for a while, and decided to try it out in Fort Myers, the closest town to Sanibel Island. Couchsurfing is an internet community with approximately 350.000 members from all over the world, offering their couch for free to people travelling around.
Check it out here: www.couchsurfing.com
Through Couchsurfing we met Eileen Loro, who warmly welcomed us to stay four nights at her place in Fort Myers. So the next day, we left the Keys and headed for Eileen. When we arrived in Fort Myers beach, our dinner at the “Pink Shell” restaurant was accompanied by a spectacular sunset. The sunsets are what make out Florida’s West coast from the East coast. After dinner, Diana and Bill from the diving-center came by and gave us homework to complete the same evening. We got a clear order from Diana: “No sex tonight!” We never really found out why…
Later we drove to Beachwalk avenue, where Eileen lives. We were a little excited of course on how this Couchsurfing would be like, as it was the first experience for us. But it turned out to be extremely positive! We were lucky to meet Eileen as our first CS-friend.
Eileen is just so warm and nice, with great energy. We hit it off immediately! Her apartment was filled with joy, colors and comfort. We felt like at home from the first day and she became a close friend to us during the few days we spent with her. We really enjoyed every minute of our stay there. She offered us our own, nice bedroom and delicate bathroom. And guess what, the bath-curtains as well as the sheets on the beds were designed in colorful fishes and shells – just like in an aquarium! Couldn`t be more perfect for a couple working on their diving-license!
Next day, we were picked up by Diana and Bill for our first day at the “scuba-school”. They took us to Cape Coral were we should do the theory and practice. We both passed the theory-exam and had our first dive in the swimming pool. It was such an intensive day, with a lot of information to absorb.
The day after we had our first open water dive. Diana and Bill took us offshore with boat to the Fort Myers beach where we dived at 6 meters depth. It was quite a scary experience because everything was so new and you were suddenly based in a new environment, with sharks possibly within a few meters distance. The visibility in the water was extremely bad (a short body length), so we both got a little claustrophobic down there, but luckily it kept us from seeing any potential sharks. Everything around us was all dusty and grey. We weren`t able to see anything except from our dive buddy Bill. But the diver-course days were new and exciting experience we much enjoyed after all.
I was constantly afraid of sharks coming by. But the fright for sharks turned out to be irrational, as the local people NEVER have heard of any shark-attacks on human beings in Florida. By that information I got a little more relaxed, but as I got calmer, a new threat appeared from the shark-shadows and replaced my shark-phobia – with an ALLIGATOR-phobia! Diana told me I should worry a whole lot more for the alligators…But the only alligator we found, was the lazy one we met at Sanibel Island. And it just seemed to be ignoring us completely. Perhaps it didn’t fancy Norwegian lutefisk…
During our stay in Fort Myers we experienced a whole lot more then diving. Eileen took us to a nice restaurant one night, the Parrot, and after that she introduced us to her lovely friends, Pamela and Italo. They have an interesting and very special life story, and agreed on sharing it with us in an interview. She was American, he was Italian, and they met in Norway in 1968 and lived happily ever since. They were generous and welcoming – and they make the best apple pai on earth - we`re sure!
Monday, October 22th we left Fort Myers. I was so sad and emotional. These three days had been so intensive, full of learning, energy-loading and everything had been sky high above our expectations. But although the stay in Fort Myers was incredible, we had to continue our travelling.
The next stop was Tampa, a city 2,5 hours drive further north. On Couchsurfing we got a positive response from a life-loving guy from Peru, David Rivas. He welcomed us to his home for two nights. We were thrilled! David turned out to live in Tampa with his wife Jenny, and their two children, Alessio and Alexandra. We soon realized we had been lucky again, because David and Jenny turned out to be a very nice couple, with a very nice restaurant, to which they invited us the first night. “Terra Sur” serves delicious Peruvian food, and we had our good share of both the food and the wine – even Peruvian wine!
The day after, we went back to Fort Myers to interview a Norwegian guy, Trond Schou who has a racing-boat business there. It was so cool to meet him and have his opinion concerning the American culture vs Norwegian. We got some interesting perspectives from him and his companion.
The next day we were invited by the Rivas to Davids brothers restaurant, where we got great Peruvian “Cerviche” – raw fish marinated in lime. It was awesome! It turned out Davids mother worked there too, so now we know both David and his family.
In the afternoon we drove to our next stop, Gainesville. There we stayed with a former schoolfriend of Bjørn Christian, Stefan Kautsch. They hadn’t seen each other for 15 (!) years. Stefan is a smart guy with a Ph.d. in Astrophysics, a big heart and great sense of humor! We also met his lovely girlfriend, Carrie from Hong Kong. In Gainesville we spent most of our days with accounting, planning, and writing diary, and the evenings socializing with Stefan and Carrie. We even came up with a new astrophysical theory: the small bang! We will explain some other time…
After three days we left Gainesville and headed for Orlando, drove straight past Disney World and Sea World, delivered our car and headed for the next chapter in “Tour the World”: Brasil, let’s Samba!
