Southern Camping Trip 2024 / Day 31

Moore Haven KOA

Moore Haven, Florida

Wednesday, March 1, 2024   

Lovers Key State Park

Marc-  We spent the day with Roberta, starting with a visit to Lovers Key.  It is the island just to the South of Ft. Myers Beach which is itself a barrier island.  The State Park is undergoing renovations on its Northern end including replacement of the drawbridge connecting it to Ft. Myers Beach.  This is due to damage done by Hurricane Ian on 9-28-2022.  The Park is open using its Southern entrance.  We spent the morning walking the beach.  We moved on to visit Ft. Myers Beach and then met up with Barbara and Michael at the brand new Margaritaville where we had lunch.  Then we walked more on Ft. Myer's Beach.  There were alot of people there, and it was a beautiful day.  So much work has been done since last year, but there is still so much more to do.  Some places have been fixed and are open again, some have been so wrecked they have been torn down and now are empty lots, and there are many places that are wrecked and we can't tell if they will be torn down or re-built.  There are not enough trades people to fix everything at once.

Puffer fish at Lovers Key.

Osprey nest near the beach.

Heavy equipment removing downed trees from the beach.

Special equipment sifting out debris from the beach sand.

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One of many reconstruction crews working at Ft. Myers Beach.

This place is awaiting help.

These two photos are from the Wyndham Hotel where we stayed in 2018.  The place was old (built in 1969) but very nice and literally on the Beach.  It cannot be rebuilt as is, will have to be built up (on stilts) and people we spoke to at the site said they don't know yet what will happen with it, but probably a high rise building of some sort will be built there eventually.

The first floor rooms were all destroyed by the 12 foot storm surge from Hurricane Ian.  

Margaritaville, a new beachfront resort on Ft. Myers Beach.  

Meeting with friends at the Resort for lunch.

Great beach access.

Margaritaville mascot.

We checked out a marina for possible future use and found this large aluminum military craft tied up.

PTF-26 is a 95 foot Vietnam & Cold War United States Navy fast patrol boat owned by the Paducah, Kentucky-based non-profit Maritime Training Foundation, Ltd. PTF-26 is one of the larger, aluminum-hulled sisters of the wooden Nasty-Class PTFs used during World War II.  This boat was capable of making 51 knots.  It is the final of 841 total PT-type boats built for the US Navy 1940-1968, PTF-26 earns the distinction of being “THE LAST AMERICAN PT BOAT”.