just another day in paradise....

:::ok well it wont let me upload pictures at the moment..so they'll have to come later:::
welllllllllllllllllllllll here's another update...
while we were waiting for Ernie to arrive. we went to his marina and were fishing and this big pelican came and landed next to us and was very curious. he KNEW when the rod bent that a fish was coming up and he would have taken it off the hook for me if we let him. instead Ed took it off and tossed it to him. He actually came back another day too!!
Ernie arrived...sometime thurday...or friday... and took us out on the boat on monday morning. the week marine forecast SUCKED to say the least, and monday morning seemed to be our best shot. so we went out around 7 am to head off shore...anddd didnt make it. i took dramamine the night before and some in the morning, felt a little iffy for a few minutes but then took another half and was fine. Ed felt pretty crappy when he was trying to focus on the fishing line and tackle stuff. so all in all it was a monstrous waste of time. but it was enjoyable "inside the reef"...the seas were more like 2-3 feet. whereas outside was a good 4-6 ft. Ernie has a pretty sick ($100k) boat, twin hull, twin outboards...so its pretty much the smoothest ride possible. i even got to drive it on the way back...top speed.... mom & dad i drove a vehicle that cost more than my 4 years at college... :-P
oh yeah, on our way out we got a close-up view of US Coast Guard Station Islamorada so here's some pictures of that...

JOB UPDATE: i (danielle) got a call from Pier 1 Imports and went and had an "interview" (chat) on saturday with the store manager and it seemed promising. she said she was going to call her boss on monday to see if she could hire me...but monday came and went and i got no call. She had told me she was in again on thursday so i will give her a call and see what the deal is. On a more exciting note...Ed never got his call-back from the captain @ Robbies, so he called him yesterday (tuesday)& left voicemail and texted him today (wednesday). Captain finally got back to him this afternoon asking if Ed was still interested in training to get up to speed and working a couple nights a week. so this is AWESOME. he's pretty pumped and is pretty much on edge waiting for hear when he can start. "working nights" basically means he goes out for the night fishing trip which would mean he works like 5-1am? give or take. the trip is scheduled for 7-12 so he would have to be there to prep and then clean up/clean fish when the boat returns.
other than that, next on the agenda is waiting for Jen, Chuck & the kids to get down this weekend (sunday)... gotta clean the apartment and the fridge and kick back and wait!! we have been very lazy the past few days kind of bumming around the marina/pool. Did some cleaning and laundry today... so thats about it!!!
we'll keep ya'll posted.

oh yeah, we officially look like floridians. (don't hate)

Week 3 of the Keys

-so we're winding down on our third week and things are going well. job hunting has not been the brightest spot of the trip so far but there seems to be some light at the end of the tunnel. when we went fishing out on Robbies party boat i talked to the captain and he told me to call him the following week to come on board for a "ride along". so i called him monday and went for my ride along tuesday. he basically wanted me to come out to see how they did things on the boat and see how well i could keep up i suppose. the ride along i guess you could say intimidating. i mean i know how to fish and all, but trying to make customers happy on the boat and helping the mates do a good job so they could make their money in tips was something i was not used to. there was no stop things to keep up with. but i think thats why i am attracted to the idea of being a mate so much. there's only a handful of things that need to be done that once i get the scope of it all i feel i could stay on top of, in the long run making the customers happy and helping the boat to catch more fish. the mates were really nice and very willing to help so that made the day go by a lot easier. one of the mates was impressed with my "whacking" skills. i never cut so much bait in my life as i did on tuesday but for some odd reason i love cutting bait. unfortunately i wasnt paid but in the long run that wasnt a bad thing. i walked off the dock with some fresh fish that made for an awesome cooked by my personal chef that i love dearly.. :) so when the day was done i got a nice boat ride, worked on my tan, and 7 hours in one of my most favorite environments; the marina. when i was done for the day i talked to the captain about whats next and he said he would love to get me on board as a mate but wasnt sure if he had room and for me to call today. so i talked to him and he said he thinks he should have some work for me and will call me in a few days to let me know more. so the situation sounds very promising. my fingers are crossed through. as weird as it might be this would certainly classify as a dream come true should i get a spot as a mate. ill blog again when i get more news. mostly everyone knows the deal since i was pretty excited to get good news from the captain that i have told everyone already. but hey were in the keys and life is grand. i hope the next post has some awesome pics of us out fishing with ernie and catching some whooper mahi mahi. ernie comes down thrusday and hopefully we can start doing some quality fishing. thats all for now.

~in regards to dani she is keeping busy putting apps in. between the two of us we have close to 25 applications out there. she has had a few bites but hasnt caught any keepers yet. when we first got down her everyone and their mother told us how dead this time of the year. well few things are for sure. one: if this is dead season the jersey shore would love to have this "dead season" two: if its dead season WHY ARE THERE SO MANY PPL DOWN HERE NOW. the shops seem to always be packed, the fishing fleets seem to be going out, there are always ppl at the condo complex, and it just took me a solid half hour+ to get to the marina 10miles down the road at 7:00am due to the amount of traffic.. one thought dani had is that maybe since schools around here are out the season is picking up. yet thats also confusing because on my way to the marina there were kids waiting on the street for the school bus with their back packs in hand. so school doesnt seem to be out. so we get more confused each time we think about the season and the possibility of getting jobs. never fear though it seems their is a mini lobster season starting soon and ppl down here are telling us how busy it gets for the short season... when i say short season im talking like a week long. so wish us luck!

thursday june 10.....happy birthday brian!!!

tuesday we adventured to Anne's beach on Upper Matecumbe key. it must be florida keys' version of a beach because it wasnt much of a new jersey beach by any means. the water was sooo shallow which made it get super hot in the sun. it was almost painful wading through the water until you got out to a foot deep or so. it was pretty much 3 feet deep all the way out to the channel and was hardly cooler than bath water... AKA not refreshing when its 95+ outside!! so we came back to the condo and swam in the chilled pool.


yesterday (wednes) we just hung out ouside by the pool and went to the marina nextdoor to try our luck fishing....saw some gigantic tarpon and a decent size (2-3 ft) nurse shark...but no luck catching anything worthy of mention.


today we went fishing with Ernie's nieces and their boyfriends who are staying in the condo complex next to ours...the day was beautifully perfect... i didnt feel sick at all, and didnt get too burnt either. the highlight of my day wasnt the fishing, but the fact that i saw my first dolphin...it was swimming in/with the wake of the boat!!! it was kind of sad because it was all by itself but it was still super cool to see. i've never seen them that close-up before!!

oh...and we caught some fish...not quite sure what kind...maybe a queen red snapper?? red color with big eyes. technically Ed out-fished me today because he got the biggest one (cobia...looks like a shark but is actually a fish) buttttt it wiggled off the hook before the captain got it in the boat! other than that we caught alot of small snappers that we tossed back but kept 6 of the red/queen snappers for dinner. Ed fillet(ed) the fish and we took it to a restaurant to cook it up for us! soo we've had a great week so far. the plan is to drop off more job applications tomorrow (friday) and get some more sunscreen!! (im sure mom will appreciate that) ---with that note. what the hell is sunscreen SO expensive?!?!?!?! thats all for now folks
-danielle

HOME SWEET HOME!

~alright here it is. our home away from home. the condo is much nicer than we originally thought, not that we thought it wasnt lovely but we never saw it before we arrived so it was a pleasant surprise. there are a lot of things to do within the complex, now that we are all settled in we are making our way around checking everything out. Life if definately good right now.
~we get to wake up to beautiful sunlight shining through and palm trees blowing just outside our window. we havent even had to set an alarm to wake up yet which is amazing. So far our days have consisted of hanging out in the marina and doing some fishing. after fishing we always hit the pool. the first time we used the pool the water was as hot as the temperature outside and it was not very pleasant, but much to our surprise the pool is hooked up to "chillers". Seems in florida the thing to do is chill the water so it is colder than the outside temp where at home we are worried about warming the pool water. either way the water feels amazing now and is much cooler than the outside temp. making taking a dip very refreshing. dani and i actually played battleship while cooling off in the pool. and yep you guessed it dani won. she has been winning a lot as of late. she keeps out fishing me in the marina too. butttt im letting her catch the tiny fish and im saving my energy for the big ones. and despite being out fished i am wayyy in the lead for the size of fish. i caught a nice size needle fish the other day and it was about 7 inches in length, by far the biggest thing we caught yet. speaking of fishing, we got dani a real pretty pink fishing rod/reel (its a breast cancer series rod/reel). we are hoping to get on a party boat this week so she can break her in. my bet she out fishes me than to. but thats ok ill still love her.


~we're living life in the keys, and the livin's easy!

the auto train

so the auto train ride started out well.... that is before we pulled out of the station. it was an experience to say the least. and if nothing else showed us we need to spend the extra money to get our own sleeper car. the whole idea was very neat just sleep was hard to come by. what more could a person really need, on board bathrooms, lounge, dinner cart, and bar. we did have a lovely dinner with a super old couple. but they were very easy and nice to talk with. and actually the husband was a rutgers alum from class of 44. and they had roots in new jersey. the scenery on the trip was very interesting and we even learned some history. the train runs along some major locations of american history and one of the conductors explained some of it to us. the major downside came when a few parents let there kids run around like the train like it was a jungle gym. and when people seat hop and choose the seats behind us to fall asleep and snore. the snoring was keeping danielle up so i had to actually wake the guy up and luckily he got the hint and moved. the train was a good idea though it helped keep the whole 1300 mile trek worth of stress off our cars while leaving us enough drive left to make an adventure out of it..... but i dont foresee us being so excited to take the train ride home.