Sunset Cruise

About a month ago, I went on a "sunset cruise" with my parents and sister Korinne on one of my parents' friend's boats. It wasn't anything fancy, but it was a lot of fun, not to mention how beautiful the sunset was!

And then here was the sky a little while later as the sun began to set more. Isn't this beautiful? How are there people who think that God isn't real? I wonder.




We went out on the Sarasota Bay and visited some sandbars that were miles from the shore isolated in the middle of the water! Here I am standing on one!

After that, we cruised over to another sandbar which I discovered had grass flats near them. Well, in high school, I took a Marine Biology course that took field trips to Sarasota Bay quite often to do research in the grass flats and find different sea creatures. I absolutely loved that class and learned a lot from it! So, Rob, the boat captain, gave me some nets and a flashlight (it was dark by now) and I started running the net through the grass flats to see what I could find! On my very first try, I caught a SEAHORSE!

I love seahorses! I think they are so unique and I find it interesting that the male seahorse carries the babies and gives birth to them! I was so excited about finding a seahorse that I was determined to find more after letting that one go back into the water! I only ended up finding one more, but I was excited still. :) Both seahorses I caught were small!

Other creatures I found included baby flounder, jellyfish, needlefish, shiner fish, hermit crabs, and lots of crawdads! It was so much fun! I was even brave to walk in the grass flats in the dark! Ha!

Well, I knew Dayna would love to go on a sunset cruise and Rob, the boat captain, told me the last time I went that I was welcome anytime and that he'd love any excuse to take his boat out. So after a stressful (very stressful!) week at work, Dayna and I headed to Sarasota directly after school on Friday to enjoy a sunset cruise. No students. No lesson plans. No papers to grade. No e-mail to check and reply to. Nothing related to school-except that Rob's wife works in the classroom that connects to my mom's classroom...so 4 teachers on the sunset cruise did generate some teacher conversation. :)
Here we are right before the cruise (Korinne has to be reminded to smile in each picture, guess she didn't get the memo in this one!)

I didn't take too many pictures this time, but we all enjoyed seeing another beautiful sunset!