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Not Thinking About the Game
Destinations · February 7, 2003

Spring training? Yeah, we've got that. The Boston Red Sox are right here in Fort Myers, Fla. The Minnesota Twins play down at the Lee County Sports Complex. It's all-you-can-eat Grapefruit League excitement.

But that's just the half of it. Unlike other Sunshine State destinations, where baseball is front-and-center during the final throes of winter, the game is really a sideshow here. A diversion.

So what's the main attraction? Confidentially, that would be the quiet Gulf beaches, the picture-perfect saltwater flats teeming with exotic fish, and a surprising number of first-rate historical attractions.

Yes, history. Take the Edison/Ford Winter Estates, the former homes of inventor Thomas Edison and car magnate Henry Ford, for example. The 20-acre complex includes two sprawling wood homes, a museum, and botanical gardens that are a showcase for unusual plants, including bromeliads, orchids and hibiscus.

But most visitors are riveted by two attractions: The chemical lab in which Edison conducted his research (you can see the actual tools used by the great inventor). And an immense Banyan tree that will some day cover the entire property. Banyans expand by sending out aerial shoots that grow into the soil, forming additional trunks. This one's more than 400 feet wide.

Who needs baseball when you've got a Banyan?

Sanibel Shelling. Turn on to Summerlin Road and cross the causeway to Sanibel Island for another reason not to think about the game. Secluded Sanibel is seashell heaven, where you can pick up anything from a pearly trochus to a brown-striped tun along the shore.

It's a place that can't possibly be confused for one of the Florida East coast's frenetic resorts. The homes are understated, the attitude more laid back. In other words, it's culturally and aesthetically about as far away from the other side of the state as America's East Coast is from its West Coast.

If you're looking for a little action, head out onto the saltwater flats, where you can hook some of the oddest-looking fish you've ever seen. The Gulf Flounder is a perfect example. It doesn't just look strange - it is strange. How else can you explain a bottom-dweller whose right eye migrates over to left side early in life?

For more of an adrenaline rush, go after a tarpon. Catching one of these fierce game fish is way more thrilling than a tie at the bottom of the ninth with the bases loaded. A tarpon - which typically weighs about 50 pounds, but is known to exceed 200 pounds in these waters - can take hours to reel in. It's the kind of fishing that keeps people coming back year after year, spring training or not.

Diving In. Ahhh, and the beaches. Sure, the tourist traps are plenty tacky - Fort Myers Beach, with its overpriced condominiums, greasy-spoon restaurants and that ever-present smell of saltwater blended with coconut oil, is anything but serene. Take me out to the ballgame, please.

But go where no one else does, to remote places like North Captiva Island or down to Lovers Key State Recreation Area, just south of Fort Myers Beach, and you'll find something different: Peace and quiet. Tropical breezes. Nothing but the warm, turquoise waters of the Gulf of Mexico gently lapping against the cream-colored sand. The only surprise will be the occasional dorsal fin of a bottlenose dolphin breaking the ocean surface, and it is always a welcome one.

Of course, that's no reason to completely ignore the baseball. From the last week in February until the first week in April, you can catch a real big-league game in a more intimate setting: City of Palms Park, on Edison Avenue, where the Red Sox play. Or the Twins at Hammond Stadium, just off the Six Mile Cypress Parkway.

Here, you'll find the strangest kind of baseball fans - the ones who avidly follow a team during the pre-season and then, once the boys of summer head back north, lose interest in their fate. Could be the fact that you don't need binoculars to see the action down here, or that a day at the ballpark won't set you back a C-note.

Bottom line: Baseball's not a bad reason to come to Fort Myers. But once you're here, you'll probably want to keep this little secret to yourself.

Christopher Elliott is a travel commentator based in Key Largo, Fla.