Thank you 2021!! We had a blast last week in Florida!! Finally an escape from the madness!!

If you follow me at all, you know that I’m a travel junkie. I love to go on trips and explore new places, whether it be a beach or mountains or beyond! Last year was a tough year for all of us. For me, it felt particularly hard in the beginning since we could not really travel anywhere. I basically filled the gap with lots of camping because that is about all we were able to do. Don’t get me wrong I LOVE camping! We had a blast on all of our camping adventures last year. But there’s just something about a BIG trip (like get on a plane and fly away kind of trip) that excites me and gives me something to look forward to.

Even though things are looking up this year, our big April vacation wasn’t happening – again – due to the Grand Cayman still not allowing tourists on the island. There was no way I was missing out on yet another vacation, so we decided to shift gears and plan a trip to Florida instead!

Bucket list check!

I’m officially checking “Plan a Spontaneous trip” off my bucket list. I basically planned this trip within 6 weeks before we left. Then once we were down there, we were enjoying ourselves so much that we extended our trip by a few extra days, giving us 10 glorious days in the warm Florida sun! Hallelujah!

Cape Coral, FL

The last time we took our kids down to Disney, they wanted to spend more time at our rental house in the pool than at the parks! I kept that in mind when planning this time around. I wanted access to both pool and beach, so I rented a house on Airbnb in Cape Coral, Florida that was right on the canal. The selling point for me was the tiki hut on the dock (which ended up being my fav spot for my morning coffee) and our “private beach”! We spent lots and lots of hours lounging and swimming in the pool!

Lover’s Key State Park

The first beach we hit up was Lover’s Key State Park. I wish we had a bit more time than a few hours here, because there are lots of trails and places to explore within the park. It would have also been super cool to rent a kayak and explore that way. We will just have to save that for another trip!

Sanibel Island – Gulf City Park Beach

After getting settled and spending a few days at our rental house, we headed to Sanibel Island to spend a morning at the beach. We had the intention of going to Lighthouse Point park, but it was a Saturday and parking seemed crowded. Instead we found an off the beaten path gem… Gulf City! The seas were rough that day, but the shells were plentiful!

Lighthouse Point Park, Sanibel

I really didn’t want to miss out on checking out Lighthouse Point Park, so we came back during the week and it was less crowded than Saturday. This was a cool beach. There were lots of big shells around the point and we even saw a dolphin swimming off shore! My kids loved it!

Cayo Costa State Park

I’m a huge fan of State Parks (& National Parks), but the unique thing about Cayo Costa is that you can only access it by boat! If we had not extended our stay in Florida, we never would have gotten the chance to see this beautiful park. I’m SO glad we did because Cayo Costa was my favorite spot of all!

If you’re a beach lover like me and enjoy “shelling”, this is the place for you! We were only able to reserve a half day trip with Tropic Star (my fault because I waited until the last minute) and it really wasn’t enough time. I could have easily spent the entire day here. There is also a super cool campground in the park that I now need to add to my list of places I want to camp!

All in all it was a great getaway! We really enjoyed visiting Cape Coral and the surrounding areas. I highly recommend a visit to Lover’s Key, Sanibel/Captiva Island, and Cayo Costa! Thanks for following along with my travel adventures!

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