January in Southwest Florida

Located between Ft. Meyers and Naples, is Bonita Springs, Florida. We spent just a few days here as a part of our combination family vacation/business trip in the winter of 2006.

While in this area, we stayed at the clean and adequate Bonita Beach and Racquet Club, just across the street, and through a restaurant parking lot, from the beach. The building we stayed in was one of five identical 10-story white buildings. Each unit overlooks the center court area, which was in need of landscaping help (maybe it was probably still being fixed up from hurricane), as well as a nice deck view on the outside. It was nice to have a place with a full kitchen, so that we could have breakfast there before heading out for the day. There is also a restaurant in the building.

On our first day here we drove to the Everglades and took a neat tour with Irv's, including 2 boat rides (pontoon and air-boat), and a bus ride. Although the boat rides were neat, the kids really liked the bus ride, too. One highlight was holding a baby alligator, very cool! The air-boat ride was more of an adventure than I expected!!

We also went to the Manatee Park in Ft. Meyers. Here you see manatees in their natural habitat. We hung out at Bonita Beach, and the kids really wanted to swim, and the Gulf was a little chilly so we did that at the condo! We shopped the Flea Market, and it was huge! It was a fun place to shop, and there’s even a bar area for those men who don’t enjoy hunting for great deals! To see further details on our activities, look for my entries on each one.

There’s a lot to do here if that's what you have in mind, or you can find a spot at the beach or the pool and do absolutely nothing. Oh, and, John got a kick out of the Master Bait and Tackle shop. It took me awhile to figure out why people were standing in front of the sign having their picture taken. They are a long-time establishment by the marina in Bonita. T-shirt and can coozies are available, tee-hee.

Quick Tips:

If you're going with kids, plan lots of free time for them to just hang out. Florida can be very expensive, but kids really enjoy the simple things, like looking for shells at the beach, and swimming in the hotel pool. We grocery shopped at the Publix and they had really inexpensive water toys and blow-ups.

Best Way To Get Around:

You will need to rent a car, a lot of the sights are a good distance away.

We arrived at the Bonita Beach Club after dark and we were initially disappointed with our 6th floor unit. The center court was dumpy looking, and in need of landscaping attention. We thought there was going to be separate bedrooms, but it was one L shaped room with a pull out couch for the kids to sleep in and a queen sized bed for us. The pull out couch was not made up with sheets, but there were sheets and a blanket in the closet. Besides the couch, there was a small reclining chair. There was a full kitchen, and a smallish kitchen table with four chairs. We had cereal, milk, and snacks from the Publix down the road. The location is ideal, it is close to everything you would need.

When the sun came up and our view was able to be seen, out attitudes changed a bit. It was a beautiful look towards Estero Bay from the 6th floor, and we had a small screened-in porch to go out and look around, but there was no furniture out there to relax on. The colors in the unit were pretty, yellow, green, and blue. It was clean, and there was a nice sized closet that had extra pillows and blankets, and a storage area with toys for the pool.

The Bonita Beach Club consists of five 10-story white buildings beside Estero Bay, and across the street from the Gulf of Mexico. Our building was the one closest to the gulf. You enter your unit from the inside court area. There are two pools here, and a kiddie pool next to the main one. The pool closest to our unit was not heated. Luckily we ventured over to the other one, and it was a comfortable temperature for swimming. There are also 10 Har-Tru tennis courts, and a putting green. If you wander across the street towards the gulf there's a bar and restaurant called Doc's Beach House that has been in the area for a long time and is a local favorite. We went over there to watch the sun set. There is also a restaurant right in the ground floor of the building we stayed in. We didn't eat there because my brother, who lives in the area, did not recommend it, but there was always a group of the 60+ crowd waiting to get in at dinner time.

We booked on Expedia, and I was psyched because it seemed like we were getting a great deal. When I was on the booking page, I learned that there was a $25 per person extra charge for more that 2 people. At that point in time I was excited about it, so I booked anyway with the extra $50 a night adding a significant amount to the total. We did enjoy ourselves, but be sure to know that you are getting an efficiency unit, and there may be an extra charge!