November SWF Beach Life Update

hey there Beach friends I wanted to give you an update and I didn't necessarily want to like junk up my Sunday videos so I'm just gonna make a whole video about what has happened in the past what is going on right now and what we can expect to see in the future so in the past we are looking at Fort Myers Beach in the past this is beautiful Fort Myers Beach from August um 2022. I have signed up with the county to it's with the keep Lee County beautiful I've they are the ones that organize the beach cleanups and so I've already signed up with them once they are ready and we have public you know getting involved in cleaning up the beaches I will be leading a chunk of Fort Myers Beach cleanup I'm excited about it they're clearly not ready for us to start doing that but when they are I am excited to get out there and start getting things cleaned out something else I did is I did reach out to another Fort Myers shell company it is a company that I've toured with before they were very involved helping out the people in Sanibel so they've just been busy I would like to kind of promote them but I want to talk to them first I don't know kind of what their situation is so I did reach out to them once I have that squared away I will let you know I really wanted to help and I in the description below there's a link of different organizations that you can reach out to get send donations to I personally wanted to really find someone like a direct donation to I did reach out to the Fort Myers Beach Elementary School staff they are displaced they are not in their regular school they're in a different school right now I reached out to their staff and they directed me to donate to the foundation for Lee County Public Schools again the information is below I didn't like that answer so I actually emailed the principal of the school and she kind of said yeah it's we're they're good right now they don't need anything else and so I've been trying to find an organization something a little bit smaller mom and pop that we can kind of help and I haven't found them yet don't but you know not to worry believe me there is going to be help that is needed for a very very long time so we're I'm going to figure that part out so what else can I tell you so that's what's happened in the past okay this is a little bit more what we're going on right now what we're seeing I took a little drive over to Bunch Beach and I guess I just not that I want to continually harp upon it but we are literally in a disaster Zone it is going to be really really messy for a long time and I'm not gonna harp on that I'm going to bring you as much uplifting and positive things that I can but please know that things are not good at the beaches um this is a shot of bunch Beach and in just a second I'm going to show you kind of it I would say side by side if it's actually going to be top and bottom of what this kind of looked like I needed to go there I I haven't been there I have not been to Sanibel and I have not been on the beach on Fort Myers Beach so really my super local beaches I haven't been there yet um other than than Bunch um we'll we'll get over there another thing that's going on now is red tide so that's kind of a bummer we have a little bit of red tide going on so that's going to keep us off the beach as well I'll Circle back to Sanibel in just a second so this is Bunch from the summer and then on top is Summer and below is um the 14th of November so that would be Monday November 14th and that's what's going on the bottom there so this is what that drive looks like now obviously it's very very different and that's to be expected there's quite a bit of damage still now one of the reasons I have not been on Sanibel is from what I can tell they're really just asking for residents contractors business owners like if you don't need to be there you shouldn't be so I haven't gone um it there's a term that's been thrown around lookiloo the looky-loos I'd never heard that term before um but I guess it's people who just want to kind of come and look at the damage which kind of I'm going to tell you I was cleaning a house out and to have people drive by kind of gawking at you stinks it's it's not good so please don't do it I'll show you what I can respectfully of the beaches but nobody wants you know to be leered at while while they're cleaning out their materials so this is Bunch Beach I think um a bunch of the bird watchers came down here so they were enjoying the beach there is still I know it's like a mess but you know there still is things to enjoy um the snails are still here the birds are still here they don't know they don't know that you know everything else that's gone on and that is a Rosy at spoon bill that one loan it is a little pink bird that's flying around up there so you know things are going to be a mess but I'm gonna try every single time to find that silver lining every single time I'm gonna be looking for that glass that is half full like this this is a lovely ladder horn snail no I could not help myself I had to just in case there might have been a Wenzel trap here so we did find a ladder horn and a little Florida horse conch and then beyond that I kind of looked at the view very different there's the North End of Fort Myers Beach and I can just tell that looks different Sanibel Lighthouse it's out there I know that that even the causeway I can kind of see where the repairs had taken place so this area is like I said it's um it's gonna take some time it's gonna take some time beaches are technically closed they can't you know done on the upside they can't charge you for parking I guess so so I guess that is what is current that is currently the things that are going on now let's talk about the future because believe me I've got plans I really want to become a Florida master naturalist that's something I've been wanting to do so next time classes are available I'm just going to bite the bullet and do it I do not have the time to do it but I'm gonna do it anyway now if something exciting that I did do after Hurricane Ian is I did have an opportunity to go out I did not make a video I was still feeling kind of funky about everything that went on and I don't know one day maybe we can talk about that but I found a lot of really awesome horse and why am I telling you well I mean how many horse does one gal need so I'm gonna auction them off they were stinky as all heck so they have been marinating curing in my yard make sure the bugs kind of come do their clean them all out real good and the salt soap and water soon I'm gonna soak them get them all cleaned up and I'm going to auction them off I'm going to raise money to help a business someone somebody down here that was affected by this miserable hurricane so you might be the proud owner of one of those I'm working on it again I gotta get them cleaned up kind of organize everything and get that going for you so I will be having an auction of these cool shows I'm also going to auction off some of my personal shell collection so that will be coming I see these need to be cleaned up a little bit but I will be doing that I'm also doing a giveaway now I've done giveaways before in the past and I'm not gonna stop so I'm pairing up with beach girl Studio to give away this really really cool candle but guess what I'm teaming up with Jamie from Plum Island Sea cabin and you're gonna get shows from Florida you're gonna get shelves from her neck of the woods you're just gonna get all sorts of fun stuff so we've been communicating and I hope to get that kind of in the books for you soon kind of thinking around the holidays um shell orders I'm going to change the way that I do I sell shells I actually had to stop for a while because I just I just couldn't handle everything I'd like to update my website so from an upload standpoint please know that I am committed to you I am committed to my channel it just might be challenging to bring you quality Beach you know quality beachy goodness on a weekly basis in the foreseeable future again I'm gonna do everything I can to kind of keep you in touch with this area keep things positive let you know what's going on and also continue to bring you the awesomeness of Southwest Florida beaches so that's my update for now please check out the description below I'm going to have all those links for you if you did want to help or some of the other organizations I have found that if you didn't want to donate that you could do that by all means leave a comment below I do read all of your comments every single one so thank you for allowing me to bring you beachy goodness as often as I can and Just One Last Thing Before I go if there is an organization or a business that you were particularly fond of do check out their website and or their Facebook page because they may have a way that you can directly help them so thank you for being awesome I'll see you on a beach real soon foreign