Busy day yesterday...left SugarLoaf Lodge after a late breakfast and Peter decided he needed to see a doctor as his ear was giving him trouble..after some directions from the Hotel we arrived on Pidgeon Key in the town of Marathon at the Fishermans Hospital Emergency department..They were terrific and put him straight in and sorted him out , hospital band and all. We knew it being Sunday of the Long weekend public holiday that they were going to touch him up but we were shocked when he was slugged $500..lol Lucky we have Travel Insurance !!
Just as we were leaving the hospital I got a phonecall from the Hotel we stayed in at Sugarloaf and Peter had forgotten his Laptop !!! So back we drove 30 minutes then turned around and started our day all over again !! Not a good day for Peter .
We got into Miami..Freeway city, holiday city busy busy and were thankful that is was Sunday and not a work day . We are staying at the Marco Polo Beach Resort north of the city and the main beaches and just South of Fort Laurderdale. Think we had selected a lovelly small holiday spot only to find the Freeway came right to the front door, the beach is at the back door and their is a mofor shopping centre (Adventura Mall) probably one of the biggest I have seen in the US and its 5 minutes away, but you have to get a bus or Taxi as there are no footpaths there because of the Freeway.. Welcome to America !!
The Hotel Marco Polo was probably a beautiful hotel when it was build for Jesus all those years ago, but today its very tired but as its the last place we have in the US we will put up with anything.. Hopefully it will improve today when people start going home after their long weekend away. So today we are going off to do a 6 hour tour around the city and waterways and hopefully we will see Don Johnson driving his boat wearing his Pale pink suit .. Will keep you posted.
Well I saw Don..only he was a cardboard cut out in a shop window.. We did a City tour and a Boat cruise around the small Isles today..getting off to a bad start..30 minutes late to pick us up, then it was a mad rush to get us into town to connect with the tour bus..Eventually got there, piled onto a big bus with other people and bang..bus wont go..so we sat for 30 minutes again while they sorted out what to do with us..Finally decided to send us on the boat cruise first then City tour last, so we had a big rush through the Bayside shopping Mall to the Docks on the other side and climbed aboard our boat. As soon as we took off I had to go downstairs at the front into the fresh air which was beautiful.. Its a busy harbour, there were 4 Cruise Ships in Dock all of them taking off while we were out on the water. They are massive..Miami is Cruise central with several shipping companies calling this home.
We Passed several small Islands, one of them has heaps of Condos on it which cost over 2 Million and the fees per year are $250,000 and its secluded so a whole pile of Movie stars own condos there ..like Tom Cruise, Julia Roberts to name a few, pretty cool really having a permanent holiday unit there where just the mega rich go and no Filthy unwashed public.. After that we sailed around Star Island and saw houses owned by Sly Stallone, Puff Diddy, The late Elizabeth Taylor and Gloria Estafan and Julio Englasias, the biggest house belonged to a bloke who owned a pharmacutical company... freaking amazing homes with boats at the back to match. After that we went back to Bayside and off the boat and onto the bus where we were whipped around the place, first stop Ocean Dve South Beach or as the locals call it. "Americas Riviera" and they wouldnt be far wrong thats for sure the road was a carpark !! Everyone out for a cruise and the cars were mostly top shelf...money money money.. It was a pretty cool place, in the street behind Ocean Drive were all the trendy shops..like "Dash" the Kardashian girls own that. nearly a star spot.
We then drove through Coconut Grove, beautiful and right next door was the first Black settlement in Miami so it went from flashy to slum ..within this area was the cemetary where Michael Jackson filmed his video clip to Thriller..another near star spot (I say). We drove around all the areas like Little Havana which may as well have been Cuba. We went to a Cigar shop and we saw the gardens where they play Dominos all day, there were lots of murals around very beautiful. We saw the cites equivalent to Rodeo drive and all the big hotels and we drove around so much we didnt get back to our hotel until 8pm. Big day but worth it to see a bit more of the city without driving ourselves. Its a beautiful city with so much water around it. its very Cuban oriented like LA is Mexican..and South Beach looks awesome for the younger generation.
Tonight I have had to buy another suitcase, the old one has been stressed to the max and is starting to split, the new one is a shade bigger, I just hope I dont go over weight too much. I guess we are going to find out on Wednesday.
Anyway enough ..more tomorrow.