March 20 - Wed.

The day started out overcast, but we decided to go to the beach anyway. We thought we would go to Lido Beach in Sarasota, about 2 hours away. On the way there we stopped for gas and a girl there told us about Siesta Beach which was a little closer and had a large parking lot. sooo - off we went to Siesta Beach. We got a real close parking place because by then it had started to sprinkle and was very windy. The beach had fine, white sand ( the kind Richard likes to do metal detecting in) but today it was pretty empty of people. We had our packed lunch there at a picnic table and Richard did a little detecting - 2dimes, 2 pennies, & a bottle cap. It was so windy we only stayed about an hour. It was early afternoon so we went to check out Lido Beach. It is in a very nice section of Sarasota, but the traffic was terrible, like driving downtown Chicago. It also was barren of people. Near the beach we saw a HUGE statue of "The sailor &the nurse kiss" ( the famous picture taken at the end of WW11) there were parking places by it for people to take pictures ...... So of course we did! It really is amazing how large it is ( see pics) we found out that a resident of Sarasota paid $500,000 to have it made in 2009, and donated it to the city. In 2012 a woman lost control of her car and crashed into it (no it wasn't me!) Her car hit the sailor's right leg and caused a crack by his waist. Structural engineers said there was fear that it would topple over. So it was taken down by cranes and shipped to New Jersey where the artist lived. It was recently brought back and re-erected. I thought that was interesting.