Shopping, Juno Beach & Off to Pelham (on Spirit Which Lives up to Its Reputation)

Sunday was a fun day spent with friends, after the week of intense tennis. Christina Kaus was off to San Diego after having a great week in doubles, and Jenny Rens/Vicki Buholz came over to spend the night before flying home.

After visiting for a few hours, Jenny, Vicki and I left first for shopping at PGA (20% discount for members is always a draw)…then we hit Anthonys (after crossing the intracoastal bridge, which was open as we arrived), to check out their extensive sun shirt collection. Vicki and Jenny both got a delicious Publix sandwich (think Subway but 10x better given the amount and variety of toppings). We drove across the street (weather was iffy) to Juno Beach Pier and intended to sit and eat…but Mother Nature had other ideas, as the threatened rain, lightning and heavy winds arrived. Once the lightning abated though (and after the sandwiches were successfully consumed), we walked onto the pier, which was covered with people fishing, some for the first time. The surf looked challenging and there weren’t a lot of people by the beach for a Spring Break Sunday.

We left just before bad weather turned into a downpour, back to Palm Beach Gardens where we enjoyed the thunder, lightning and rain from inside the house, and much later the doubles and singles finals from Miami.

It was pouring…and I forgot to put the cushions under cover before we left…oops

I got an alert in the evening that my 6am flight to Birmingham (Alabama) had been cancelled…so had to quickly see if Lori Robertson could still let me ride with her to the airport in Fort Lauderdale, after which I bought a ticket to Birmingham on Spirit Airline (and got a refund of my original ticket…so much for well-made plans).

Spirit deserves its negative publicity in my opinion. It took a very long time just to drop off a bag (around an hour or so I think), the staff were unhappy, the bag drop line was out the door…you pay with your time when you fly Spirit and if you don’t (because you booked a front seat), you pay with $$ anyway. And once past bag check…the TSA scanner froze when my bag was in it!). Nonetheless we made it with a few minutes to spare to the gate, and on to the plane (which to be fair is pretty new) and the flight is a nonstop…. And actually took off which I cannot say about the American Airlines flight, which was just plain cancelled…travel hiccups but nothing tragic thus far!