The deck is sea-foam green with purple and orange accents. A giant bamboo trellis carries air-potato vines over the sitting area. A bottle tree made of insulators lights up at night. People fish from here, sit to catch the winter sun, park to get to the guesthouse, launch boats, drive golf carts and gators, drag hoses and a few too many other things. The poor old country centipede couldn't take the stress. It always had tire tracks and cow paths through it.

So we came up with a plan to have our turf and drive on it too. The entire area was raised about six inches for perfect drainage. Then most of it was covered with crushed brick (much smaller than brick chips) and perfectly formed, level circles of crew-cut turf dot the area. The round turf rugs are big enough to host chairs but leave enough room in the brick dust for gators and carts to drive by. The purple and orange deck accents moved right down into the red brick, in the form of pots and special container plants.