Blessed are the Intrepid, Day 7:
Shells and Stars in Sanibel
August 19, 2019
Real quick: I photographed the gosh darned Milky Way 🌌 last night. I needed to say that first as it would not have happened if the earlier parts of the day played out differently. So the 2-hour traffic delay on the I-75, the extended shelling expedition at Bowman’s Beach, losing track of time after a longer than expected walk to the Sanibel Island Lighthouse from my campsite at Periwinkle Park, not setting up camp prior to leaving, and the loss of all daylight as a lightening storm made a scary and confusing walk back to camp all set up conditions for my spontaneous night shoot.
But let’s take it back to the morning. Leaving my campsite at the break of dawn, my goal was to head south to Sanibel Island, an island well known for its beauty and its shells.
I had a quick breakfast at Farmacy Vegan Kitchen in Tampa. A tofu scramble platter. Good sustenance for a trying ride south. An accident on I-75 would add an additional two hours to my travel time. I was kind of confused about why my directions computer person did not find an alternate route, but what can you do?
After arriving on Sanibel Island, I headed right to Bowman’s Beach, a white-sand beach filled with beautiful and colorful shells. Considering its beauty, it wasn’t too crowded. Mostly European travelers.
So. Many. Shells.
And some more blue skies today, thank goodness. The water was a gorgeous aquamarine. After two hours of shelling it felt ridiculous that I hadn’t gone into the water! So I got in there.
From the water camera
Shelling in the water. More on the selling haul on Day 8’s post as I cleaned them up for a photo in the following a.m. while I did a well-needed load of laundry.
After the beach, an amazing sandwich and smoothie from The Sanibel Sprout. This place was a godsend. I really needed vegetables.
Beautifully presented, great service, and delicious food. I want to bring this place on the road with me.
This is a coconut bacon, lettuce and tomato with lentil chips. And the Emerald Mermaid smoothie: Banana, mango, apple, kale, lemon, lucema. Perfect lunch.
After checking in to my campsite, I walked to the Island’s lighthouse. It was about 2 and a half miles one way, but I really needed to get moving after sitting in the car so long.
As far as lighthouses go, it wasn’t very impressive.
But the shore line, which I would walk back all the way to camp, was a delight. And the clouds were creating strong contrasts that I couldn’t stop taking pictures of. Reminded me of chiaroscuro. Then this rainbow came. Can you see it?
Watching the birds fish for their evening meals was neat too. And other birds snapping fireflies out of the sky and gulping them up. If you follow me on Instagram, you saw that.
People were shelling by this shore… like sitting right in this mop of smelly seaweed. I told one of the women I saw doing this about the Bowman’s Beach. Because I didn’t want her to continue sitting in the seaweed.
As I walked the beach, which was only accessible through the private properties of surrounding resorts/hotels, I started to lose the light. The shore remained a safe place with wandering beach combers and couples walking in the sand. But none of them had 2 miles to walk back like I did.
The sky was looking a bit restless and lightening began bolting over the Gulf of Mexico. I started to walk hurriedly as I feared getting caught in a storm. A nice German couple let me cut through their hotel property and wanted to drive me back to my campsite! (I haven’t mentioned how much kindness people have been treating me with. It’s a lot of little things that warm my heart many times a day.) To add to a growing distress, I was turned around and made a few wrong turns–the darkness, the barking dogs, the lightening flashes, the fact that I hadn’t set up my tent–I started to walk faster. I mean, get lost faster.
But as I made, finally, the correct turns back into Periwinkle Park, I had my eye on the sky, hoping I wouldn’t have to set up camp in the rain. But since my eyes had been adjusting to the dark on my walk home, I noticed, with a shifting mindset, that the stars were really vivid! Upon arriving back at my car, I immediately got my tripod and camera set up for a night shoot, not knowing if clouds would soon overtake the sky as they had over the Gulf.
The shoot would be experimental, low stakes, relaxed. I played around with settings, palm tree composition, tripod height and angling of camera. I shot many pictures before noticing what was happening. Clouds kept moving along covering a blanket of really clear stars. The sky kept lighting up with lightening. Then I knew magic was in the air when I saw my first shooting star. Unlike the Perseid, where I only saw them in pictures, this was a true wish opportunity!
After reviewing some of the shots, watching the clouds pass through from picture to picture, I notice that there was what I thought was a cloud not moving as the others were. With a zoom in, I realized it was the Milky Way! Even with lightening bolts lighting up the sky, the camps lights scattered about, and the clouds moving over its wonderfulness, there it was. Mysteriously and without my knowing how, there it was. (🎵 And this science I don’t understand...)
I used my Star app to confirm if it was the Milky Way, but it kept popping up ads… and I didn’t want to ruin my eyes adjustment. But it did say that meteor showers were in the sky. Reviewing only 10 or so pictures of the 200 I took, I saw this one with two shooting stars…
And another!
I cannot upload all the pictures of my shoot until I am at home given the disc space on my laptop. But these right here make me very happy. I never thought I could actually get the Milky Way without much more expensive equipment. I have an older model DLSR and a used lens that cost me about $200. And a tripod. That’s it! The classes I took and the trial run at Cherry Springs helped me immensely.
Oh, another shooting star!
Luck and timing, once again, hold the cards. I am grateful I was around when they aligned this time. And I am humbled to look upon the face of the universe.
[…] me, the most clear, dark skies to my memory. When I saw the Milky Way again, the same joy as in Periwinkle Park but also confusion. How could this be? In between some of the many shots I took at my campsite at […]