Cautiously Reopening

A couple of Black Skimmers hanging out with their Royal Tern cousins yesterday

Under Phase 2 of Florida's reopening plan, (undetermined start date), vacation rentals will be allowed to open but only for Florida residents. Anyone who is traveling internationally or from an area considered a COVID-19 hot spot will not be allowed to rent. There must be 72 hours between guests checking in so units can be thoroughly cleaned and disinfected. Whether this will be enforced is not known but the Phase 1 total shutdown is already being ignored by some vacation rental owners so I imagine Phase 2 restrictions will be widely ignored as well. The wording "should consider" in the governor's guidelines is partly to blame. There are not similar strict restrictions for hotels for some reason.

With the beginning of Phase 2 restaurants will be able to increase seating to 75% capacity with six feet separating parties of no more than ten people. Restaurants are advised to screen workers before work and to "consider" requiring employees to wear masks while indoors or in close proximity to guests. Gyms will be allowed to reopen at 75% capacity with six foot distancing and cleaning of equipment between usages. There are no restrictions on beaches other than those imposed by local governments. Hopefully Cocoa Beach will continue to try to stop the massive littering problem we suffer at the hands of daytrippers with $250 littering tickets. I predict lukewarm enforcement with little impact.

Cocoa Beach has had one new case of Covid-19 since my last post bringing our total to eight. Cape Canaveral is still at just two confirmed cases.

Real estate activity is already picking back up with 16 condo units and four single family homes going under contract in the last seven days in Cocoa Beach and Cape Canaveral. For sale inventory remains virtually unchanged. Those looking for a direct ocean unit above the ground floor with at least two bedrooms and two baths have four possibilities under $400,000, two of those at Stonewood of Cocoa Beach.

Many of our local restaurants have reopened for dine-in guests. Among those, The Fat Snook reopened yesterday with a few intriguing new menu items for returning guests. Takeout is still offered. Kudos to them for sharing their safety protocols. Looking forward to the yummy Instagram posts resuming. Reservations are required at most of the newly reopened establishments. An almost complete list of restaurants with links and phone numbers can be found here.

In other news Delta announced today that they are retiring permanently all 18 of their Boeing 777 aircraft.

“If the brain were so simple we could understand it, we would be so simple we couldn't.” ______Lyall Watson