I hope you and your friends are enjoying your trip. How are things at the resort? Is everything up and running? The weather looks great!
My DW and I arrived at Crystal Shores yesterday late afternoon. According to the front desk representative, the resort was at 57% occupancy with more guests arriving during the week. The staff have been addressing some of the villas which had minimal water intrusion but the resort is in overall great shape.
We drove down to Florida from Virginia on Sunday and Monday purposely along I-95 and encountered a few gas stations that had no gasoline but most were open with no long lines. That is not what was reported in the Tampa/St. Pete area and along much of the Gulf coast hit hardest by Hurricane Milton which is why we avoided those regions. Gasoline supplies are due to return to normal by midweek according to the news outlets. There is gasoline available on Marco Island.
Silts and Pizza Cucina, the on-site restaurants, opened up yesterday as did Marco Water Sports. The lower cascades and grotto pool are also open. The upper cascades pool remains closed due to maintenance as posted on the resort status web link. Most resort activities appear to be ongoing according to the posted schedule.
The State of Florida Health Department does not recommend that one enter the Gulf water at the beach due to high bacteria levels following Hurricane Milton. There is a corresponding note posted in the lobby at check-in. While most guests seem to be following this recommendation, we did notice a few people swimming or waste deep in the water today. The beach still needs to be cleaned up due to the greater amount of seaweed that washed up than is normal. The beach in front of the JW Marriott has been altered somewhat due to beach erosion and their tiki huts sustained damage and are being rebuilt.
https://share.earthcam.net/tJ90CoLm...XU7IxC4!/jw_marriott_marco_island/camera/live
I ran into the Crystal Shores resort manager, John Louie, this morning who reported that amazingly the resort sustained minimal damage due to Hurricane Milton. Gratefully, most of the employees all faired well overall from the storm.
Marco Island overall was spared the worst of Hurricane Milton certainly compared with points further north on the Gulf coast. There was minimal cleanup debris on the sides of Collier compared with what we’ve observed during previous stays here following several past hurricanes occurring this time of the year.
. It's particularly confusing in the keys with the gulf on one side and the Atlantic on the other.