Ford, Edison and seeing how the other half live in Naples

Saturday night, 28th February

I hope Curt is alright. He's nowhere in sight this morning and I know he was setting off on a mercy mission last night to rescue a friend who, I think, had imbibed too much and couldn't drive home.
So I write him a hastily scribbled note and set off for Fort Myers.



The Edison and Ford Winter Estate opens at 9am and I am keen, with Katie's recommendation from last night, to fit it into my schedule.
The early start means that I am one of the very first visitors so, armed with a map and an audio guide, I set off into the 13-acre estate that Thomas Edison and his close friend Henry Ford, acquired and in which they built their winter residences.
I have the place entirely to myself. The caretaker's house is itself impressive, but of course the two main residences and a very impressive guest house in between reflect the status and wealth of these two great industrial pioneers. Edison used his little office in his later years, the original laboratory having been shipped to the Ford Museum in Deerborn, Michigan, where I have also visited.
The location is to die for, with their own private pier, built so that most of the construction materials and contents for the homes could be shipped directly to Florida from further north.
The gardens are especially impressive, with all sorts of trees brought for various Edison-esque experiments, ranging from bamboo for light bulb filaments and rubber trees, a project in association with tyre magnate Harvey Firestone.
I potter happily around the grounds for an hour and a half, admiring the peace and the fresh air. As the day heats up, the groups start to arrive, so I set off to join a tour round the impressive laboratory and then to the museum, filled with an extraordinary array of Edison's triumphs. Light bulbs, phonographs, cement, film projectors, ticker tape machines, in all he filed well over 1000 patents.

Not bad for a former newsboy on the Grand Trunk Rail Road!
The drive to Naples on the Interstate is thankfully only an hour or so. With bumper to bumper cars weaving in and out, it's not a particularly pleasant drive.
The approaches to Naples reflect the wealth that abounds in this part of Florida. Immaculately coiffured lawns sweep up to gated entrances to places like Moon Lake, Fox Fire and Glen Eagle Golf and Country Club (I imagine if they had added the plural bird, a lawsuit would have ensued).
I check in at the very upscale boutique hotel, the Inn on Fifth, my home for the next three nights. I am very glad Mr. Hertz has provided me with an especially smart motor car. Everybody else seems to have Bentleys and Porsches. I have a lovely suite with everything you could ever want but, surprisingly, no fridge. One is delivered to my room within minutes, so my orange juice and milk will survive!
I am booked on a boat trip and, with the car having been whisked away by a parking valet to some unknown location, I walk the half dozen blocks to Naples City Dock. But the place is massive and, when I ask, everybody points me in opposite directions for the Sweet Liberty berth.
I am slightly flustered as time to sailing is getting short, when realise that a US Coastguard helicopter is doing a demonstration right next to a mast emblazoned with the yacht's name. Hurrah!
We set sail and Mitchell, the skipper, points out some astonishingly high-end properties. One is a mere $8.5 million. But were it on the opposite bank, in the prestigious Port Royal, it would be double that. There's a few in the high teens bracket, but the most expensive one belongs to New Yorker, Alan Geary. It's 50,000 square feet and worth an estimated $145 million. Gulp.
Sweet Liberty has got a 53' mast and an impressive 1000 square feet of sail. So, when we get out into the Gulf of Mexico, wind power takes over. Despite 38 years in the Royal Navy and Reserve, it's still a real thrill to be on a boat. Thankfully, as one of only two indigenous Floridians I have met so far, he's been a water baby almost since birth and knows what he is doing. The channel out to the Gulf is like the motorway down from Fort Myers, with the driving just as erratic. And of course, unlike Mitch, these guys have no licences. Scary.
I enjoy a cup of tea in my suite before heading downstairs to McCabe's Irish Pub and Grill. The hotel owner, Bostonian Philip McCabe, had a complete 4,200 square foot pub designed and built in Donnybrook, north of Dublin and shipped in containers to Naples.
Ryan, my server is young, but like so many, only comes to Florida in the winter. He is a graduate of Michigan State University and normally runs a fine dining restaurant, the Yankee Rebel Tavern, on Mackinac Island on the northern Michigan peninsula. I went there once and reclaimed it, and the nearby Sleeping Bear Dunes, for the Queen!
The meal is great and Ryan is really good at stopping the kitchen sending out the food as soon as it ready, averting the horrid American habit of delivering it to your table before you are half way through your previous course.
A live musician sets to with a menu of Irish standards such as 'Wild Rover' and 'Whisky in the Jar'. The audience joins in lustily. As I write this, three floors above, I can hear strains of 'Cracklin' Rosie' and Folsom Prison. Neil Diamond and Johnny Cash clearly have Irish connections! But I hope the revelry doesn't keep me awake. Tonight I am in so much need of a full night's rest.

History, art, manatees, hot springs and baseball

Thursday 26 February

I have planned quite a few visits today during my drive south, so I am packed up nice and early and am on the road by 0930. I have carefully pre programmed the Hertz 'Never Get Lost', press the button and set off. I've planned to go to the Warm Mineral Springs first, and, depending on time available, will try and fit in a placed called Historic Spanish Point in the appropriately named Osprey.
So it's a huge surprise to me to be told by Mr. Hertz' GPS that I have arrived at Historic Spanish Point. Please blame the operator and not the technology!
The elderly volunteer at reception takes some persuading what to do with my Sarasota VIP Visitor card, but relents. It is only as I am sitting watching the introductory video, that I realise that she has confiscated my valuable card.
My pass safely retrieved, I head off into Spanish Point itself.
It's a gorgeous day, the place is delightfully peaceful and I have a thoroughly enjoyable walk for a couple of miles through the 30 acre site. Most folk seem to be using the courtesy golf carts to move about. There are historic buildings, carefully reconstructed evidence of people living in the area 4000 years ago and beautiful gardens. The utterly charming butterfly garden has been built with funds from the May family in memory of their grandmother Louine McCuaig, a former museum volunteer. I see enormous Monarch butterflies and several other species flitting about. The whole place is delightful.
I have noticed several artists at work. I have taken pictures of several, including local North Port artist, Ron Sanders. Later I meet another, Heather McCullough, who tells me that all the paintings will be on show at the Venice Art Gallery tomorrow evening.
I love the atmosphere and the tranquillity of Spanish Point (www.historicspanishpoint.org). It is utterly charming and I wish I could have stayed a lot longer.
But there's an opportunity to visit my first ever mineral spa at North Port. The publicity blurb claims it is the original fountain of youth sought by Ponce de Leon almost 500 years ago.
My Sarasota VIP card again goes down a storm. The lady reads it, makes a phone call, then offers me the standard AAA $2 discount on the $20 entrance fee. I point out the small print which says clearly, 'Complimentary admission for two', and manage to negotiate the entry, loan of a towel and a locker key. The changing facilities are badly in need of upgrading and I joke with my neighbour, a gentleman from Minnesota, that we will have all our ills repaired in the spring, only to catch some lethal disease from the accumulated grime on the floor. Not at all nice. He also discovers that his key will open my locker and several others.
The spa itself is an impressive 1.4 acres and is fed by a spring which delivers 9 million gallons a day of 87 degree warm water. The mineral content is said to be higher than that in Vichy, Aix les Bains and Baden Baden. Bizarrely it is full of Russian ladies with hats on and all sorts of other eastern European visitors. I do one circuit of the rather sulphurous smelling water, brush against a turtle or two, and decide to brave the changing rooms again before setting off for Fort Myers.
Beside the road are lots of classy looking housing developments with names like 'Heron's Glen' and 'Eagles Rise'. I make sure my car doors are locked when roadside signs announce that State Prisoners are working at the roadside.
I am shocked by the standard of driving on the Interstate. People are texting while hurtling along at 65 miles an hour, undertaking seems to be the norm, as is chatting on a mobile phone., I am astonished to discover later that all of this is perfectly legal.
It's spring training season for America's professional baseball players and, in late February and March, they are busy in Florida getting ready for the forthcoming season. I am helped to find a parking space right in front of the ground by three very friendly local policemen who each pass me to their colleague by radio. I rather doubt if the same courtesy would be extended in Britain to an American visiting a Premiership football ground!
The Boston Red Sox are based in Fort Myers and today they are playing the Pittsburgh Pirates. I am sitting right behind the action, in one of the best seats in the house, protected from stray balls by a very solid looking net. Two Sox fans, one a retired cop from the north end in Boston, where I have stayed, explain to me the intricacies of the action. At the end of the seventh inning, they join in enthusiastically with a fans' version of Neil Diamond's 'Sweet Caroline'. It's apparently what always happens at Fenway Park, their home ground, now sold out completely for the forthcoming season, as it has been for several years.
After the game, in roasting hot temperatures, I head for Matlacha (pronounced Matla shay), to check in to the Sun and Moon Inn. This turns out to be an absolutely lovely little bed and breakfast inn, right overlooking the water. There's a Fed Ex parcel full of goodies from Katie at the visitor centre. It feels like Christmas!
I'm not in the place for half an hour before Curt, the owner, comes to tell me about the 30 or 40 manatees that will be passing by on the outgoing tide. Incredible, I hadn't seen one till a couple of days ago and now there are dozens swimming past my bedroom. Shortly afterwards, there's another lovely sunset.
I'm delighted with how things are going. Florida is, at last, revealing some of her secrets.