AKA the land of toll roads and no-free-parking
Thursday
We flew to Orlando on Southwest. More than half of the 3 hour and 20 minute flight was as bumpy and turbulent as a wild roller coaster. I’m a pretty seasoned traveler, and even this was more than I could take at times. But we arrived safe and sound at 8 p.m. And we weren’t on the ground more than five minutes before we were plagued by one of Florida’s most dangerous creatures. Panthers? Nope. Alligators? Nope. How about “lost/confused tourists?” Brian was almost knocked over by a very confused member of the species who didn’t feel like he should hold on during the train ride between terminals in the airport. Then it was just many more of them at baggage claim – no one willing to give an inch in what’s probably the world’s worst turf battle – trying to get your bags off the baggage carousel. It was amazing to me that people will stand in your way as you try to claim your bag out of fear they will lose their space right in front of the carousel – even if it means you drop you bags on their feet, which I just about did.
We made it out of the airport and tried to follow my very bad directions from Google. But after a call to my cousin, we were on our way. We arrived at her house at about 10, which was later than I’d hoped since I would have welcomed the chance to visit with her more. She was gracious enough to put us up so that I could visit my grandmother Friday morning. My grandmother has been in an assisted living/memory care facility since my grandfather passed away last fall.
Friday
These birds greeted us first thing Friday morning. They were huge and making the craziest noise!
Soon we were on the way to Ft. Lauderdale to my dad’s. $16 in tolls and 3 ½ hours later, we were at my dad’s. He had not met Brian yet, so this was a very important trip to me because I was finally introducing the two most important men in my life to each other. We had a great time visiting with him, Frankie (my little stepbrother), my stepmother Mary, my sister Elena and her boyfriend Ozzie. We were even graced by visits from superman and spiderman.
But after some failed fishing in the lake behind the house and a wonderful meal of filet mignon cooked up by my dad, it was time to hit the sack. My dad was gracious enough to get us a hotel room close to the house because his house is what my sister and to as “the place silence goes to die” due to the rambunctious 3 ½ year old and three dogs.
Saturday
We went back to dad’s to have breakfast before making our way to the beach. Unfortunately my sense of direction down here isn’t as great as it used to be (although I swear it was due to the bad directions from google once again), we ended up going about 45 minutes out of our way. I just called it the scenic route so I could show Brian my old neighborhood.
We finally made it to the condo, and here’s the view that awaited us:
Then it was time for our first excursion to the beach. This short visit was quite event filled as we saw a woman who thought that it was totally acceptable to just change her top in the middle of the beach. Unfortunately this was not our last encounter with half naked women on the beach.
And a funny banner we saw on the beach a few times.
In case you can't read it, it says "Be kind to your implants. Run easy Miami." It was for Reebok.
That night we made our way down to downtown Miami to fill my Cuban food cravings. We ate at Bongo, which is owned by Gloria Estefan. I was a bit hesitant to eat at such an “established” Cuban restaurant since we usually go to the hole-in-the-wall by my dad’s house, but the food was great! I couldn’t have been happier with the restaurant choice, and Brian even said “it was much better than I was expecting.” I never could figure out just what he was expecting, but it was definitely a good choice for me and for his first real Cuban meal.
After dinner we thought it would be fun to go see a late-night showing of Spiderman 3. The movie wasn’t that good and unfortunately it was not the kind of crowd we would prefer to see a movie with. I will just leave it at saying that it was a very “mixed” group. People talked back to the screen, laughed at weird places and just milled about in the aisles during the movie. If you want to more descriptive version, you’ll have to ask as I don’t feel it’s appropriate to write it here.
Sunday
We slept in a bit since we didn’t get back from the movie until almost 2 a.m., had some breakfast and then hit the beach. This time we decided to go to South Beach. And if I can say anything about South Beach it’s this – I’m not sure where all the skinny people go to sunbathe, because they definitely weren’t there. It was a whole lot of very big women in very little bathing suits. And here’s where we encountered our second topless woman. However, the difference with this one was that she was actually sunbathing without her top whereas the other woman had just changed clothes. We had a nice time anyway but after a few hours our fair skin had had enough, so we made our way back to the condo for a little late-afternoon nap before heading back up to dad’s for dinner.
Monday
We awoke at about 4 a.m. to winds that sounded like a hurricane was coming through. It was unbelievable how loud the wind was. It was so strong it blew the heavy patio furniture down the side of the deck.
Having both received a little more sun than we needed, we decided to make Monday a wandering day instead of another beach day. We had lunch in downtown Miami, and then I took Brian on a tour of my old neighborhood.
My old house - it's changed a lot since we lived there, but you can see my old bedroom at the far left. I do miss the big frontyard, which has been replaced with a circular driveway.
We had dinner at the condo, cooking for the first time since before we’d left. It was nice to just relax together without dealing with the noise and hassle of going out for our last night in town.
Tuesday
It was sadly time to go home. We took a few last parting shots to capture the nice trip and made our way to the airport.
It was such a wonderful trip, and I definitely look forward to our next one. Although on the way home, we encountered a girl with such a short shirt I half wondered if we were going to see our third set of boobs for the trip. She was greeted in Albuquerque by a guy covered with tattoos, at least 2” ear spaces and implanted horns in his forehead. Sadly I couldn’t capture this guy on camera without it looking too obvious, but it was an interesting way to wrap up our adventures.
