We weren't sure what the drive south on 27 to Miami would be like. Mapquest estimated it would take a couple of hours to get to the campground in south west Miami. Thinking that we might run into some congestion as we neared Miami we left Clewiston early..ish Saturday morning. Well, it looks like 27 is just far enough west that development has not yet spread out that far. Highway 27 was a pleasant drive and no real congestion as we neared Miami; even after we turned south on 997 the traffic wasn't nearly as heavy as we thought it might be. Taking it easy, we arrived at the Miami Everglades RV Resort just after noon. The area around the RV park is nothing but huge nurseries for fruit trees, palms and exotic plants. Right next door is the huge Redland Nursery at a mere 250+ acres.
We had some shopping to do so, given that it was still relatively early in the day, we headed into Miami to the Dadeland Mall... NO, make that the Dadeland ZOO! Man, what a packed place; both in the parking lots and inside the mall! We figured that most of it had to do with the fact that Sunday was Mother's Day. After leaving this mall we headed back towards the RV park via a stop at another mall, the Palms at Town and Country, where there is a Nordstrom Rack, Loehmans amongst others. Much less frenetic.
While at the Dadeland mall we discovered there was a Miami Dade Metro station across the main drag from the mall. This is the southernmost stop so we decided this is where we would park and take the metro to the Marlin's ball game on Sunday. Nice and easy, $5 each for a day pass and $4 to park, at the metro station, for the day. This was an easy way to get to the park and saved a lot of driving, not to mention parking hassles and worked out to be at least $10 cheaper to boot.
Sunday off we went to the ball park. We parked at the Dadeland station, jumped on the metro then took the Marlin's shuttle from downtown to the park. Another benefit of taking the metro was that as we neared the park the skies opened up and the rain came down in buckets. The shuttle dropped us off close enough to avoid getting absolutely soaked, but, unfortunately we were not able to get a decent picture of the outside of the park.
We had printed our own tickets but wanted the real thing for our MLB ticket stub collection. The box office folks were very accomodating and printed new tickets (the real thing) for us. The new Marlin's park is a pretty cool design with the removable roof which, on this day, was closed for obvious reasons.
One of the coolest features is the "Bobblehead Doll Museum" they have on the main concourse level. It's also sort of neat because the whole display shakes so the bobbleheads are all moving constantly...(we took pics of some of our favorites and put them in our Picasa album)...
We had excellent seats fairly high up between home and first base. From our seats we had a great view of the Miami downtown skyline through the huge windows behind the left field fence...
The game itself was low scoring for the most part and close. The Mets took a 2-0 lead into the 6th when the Marlins tied it at two. The Mets then scored 2 in the top of the ninth to send many fans packing as the Marlins came to bat down 4-2. Unfortunately for those fans who lost patience, the Marlins tied the game then with the bases loaded, Giancarlo Stanton unloaded a bases loaded home run to end the game with the Marlins winning 8-2 and sending the remaining fans home quite happy. After the game we jumped on the shuttle for the metro but it appears we were lucky coming into downtown when the train came right away, as we had to wait over half an hour for the out bound train to take us back to Dadeland. Once again, the inner city metro proved to provide a bit of an unwanted scene as a young man took quite a while trying to find a vein in the very messed up looking arm of his female companion. It was a bit gruesome and most people that got on the car eventually got up and moved away from them (as did we). We guessed he must have been successful, shooting her up, as they eventually got up and left the train a few stops before ours.
Anyway, with the Marlin's win our game record for this trip is one win each for the home and visiting teams. We'll see how the Tampa Rays do some time next week.
After the game we stopped again at the Palms at Town and Country as we had seen a cool looking bar overlooking the lake in the center of the complex and decided to give it a try. Seemed like a good place to have a nice glass of wine and meal for Mother's Day. The setting was pretty nice but the food.. well, for a fairly busy place there was bugger all on the menu. We settled on what ended up being a couple of very mediocre flatbreads.
However, the good part came when I looked out the window across the lake and said to Kris "...maybe you should have a look over there, by the railing where the people are looking into the water...". Kris peered out and asked "what?" then said "oh, I see, is that what I think it is?". The answer was "yes, it is an alligator". We took turns going out to have a closer look...
At one point, while looking over the railing at this thing, a lady said that she didn't want to look because the alligator might jump (besides the railing there was about a 4-5 foot straight drop concrete wall into the water). I suggested she shouldn't be too afraid because the alligator was missing one of it's rear legs so it was unlikely to be able to launch itself the full 8-9 feet straight up. That seemed to calm her fears :-)
Monday we went on a South Beach Food Tour. This was just excellent. The tour was of the South Beach area which is famous for its Art Deco architecture and vibrant club and bar scene.
The area had fallen onto hard times in the 1960's and 70's and but for the foresight of a few interested citizens would likely have been razed for sky scrapers. Most of the buildings are right across the road from Miami Beach and are only 3 or 4 stories tall, so you can imagine how different the area would be. One of the turning points was when Andy Warhol visited and started to talk about the area with other artists and style makers. But the real turning point was the opening scene of Miami Vice when Don Johnson leaned over the railing of one of the hotels, surveyed the scene (probably lit a cigarette), exuded total coolness, defined sex appeal for the 1980's and the area suddenly became the HOT centre of America.
Miami is the gateway to Latin America and the cuisine reflects this. We visited Colombian, Argentinian, Peruvian, nuevo Cuban, and Jewish restaurants, deli's and coffee bars. One hotel lobby features gigantic pictures a la Andy Warhol where the images are made of Nespresso type coffee tubs...
The tour also stopped outside the Versace mansion...
...one of the few buildings on the blocks facing the beach which is not Art Deco or Miami Deco style. It is a copy of the home of Cristopher Columbus in Santa Domingo (which we have visited, but it was so long ago that I really can't say if it is a good copy) and was built in the 1920's. Versace wanted to enlarge the property by buying the adjacent lot on the corner and tearing down the Art Deco building on that site. By this time the Art Deco buildings were protected, but he apparently wrote a large cheque to the School Board and was given permission to proceed. Mirka (our guide) said that Gianni paid $20 mill for the property, spent another $30 mill on renovations and after he was shot on the doorstep, his sister inherited the property but as she didn't want to live there she sold it. Donatella Versace is a good business woman, so when she sold the property for only $30mill, it appears to be a poor sale ..... but she kept the house contents and sold them for a total of $70mill. Some garage sale!
Another story she told us is that Jean Paul Gaultier, who partied at the mansion, got his inspiration for Madonna's cone bra outfit from the nautical porthole features on a building a few doors down the block...
Apparently the area really howls at night with a very active club scene, including a fab gay club called the Palace because "....every Queen deserves a palace". Sadly, with our campsite so far away, there was no possibility of an evening out, but we decided if we ever came here again we would stay at one of the beautifully restored hotels and enjoy the scene for an evening or two.
We really enjoyed this tour; we probably would not have made a point of coming to this area so this has proved to be one of the highlights of the trip so far...(a few more pics of samples are in our picasa album)...
In fact, it was so excellent, as soon as we got back to the RV Park we went online and signed up for the Little Havana Food Tour, but that's next Saturday so we'll have to wait until next week to comment on that.
Tuesday, we packed up the wee trailer and headed south through the keys to Key West. Here we hit a new high in our accommodation costs. Compared to our nightly cost of $38 in Miami, we paid $125 in Key West (both prices including taxes). Yes, Key West is an expensive place. Now, to be fair, we opted for a water front spot at the RV Park in Key West and it was very nice indeed. On the other hand, driving past the inland spots which would have cost us $80 plus taxes, there was consistently a rather strong "eau de sewer" smell. We decided to stay for two days.
Tuesday afternoon we drove to Duval Street (aka downtown). Walking around we found a restaurant named the Black Fin and went in for lunch; mostly because we wanted to see how it compared to the Black Fin back home in Comox. Not quite the same type of place, menu, or view so it is hard to compare but we did have a very nice lunch before continuing our wander around the very touristy downtown area.
First thing Wednesday, we headed back into town and found the Mile Zero marker for US Highway 1 which runs from Key West up to Maine...
and also the marker for the southern most point in the continental USA (only 90 miles to Cuba and probably the farthest we can get from home and still be on the continent)...
Afterwards, we were having lunch at the campground by the water when it was Kris' turned to say "... hey, look a manatee!!!" whereas the response was "...yeah sure...", but lo and behold, not one, not two but three manatees snuffling around in the shallows a mere 15 feet or so off shore directly in front of us. The water was not all that clear and it was hard to get a picture as they stuck their heads out of the water only briefly but here's one try...
For big lumbering slow things they don't give enough warning as to when they will surface and then they dip down below the water again very quickly.
It was really cool and we stood there and watched them for about an hour before they snuffled off down the coastline. We found out later that they will come right into shore if you turn on a hose with fresh water and spray them, but we were also told that that particular practice is illegal. That said, we decided if the manatees came back we would give them a small squirt with the hose to see if we can see them better, however, it appears they found happier hunting grounds than in front of the wee trailer.
Later we wandered around more of the crappy tourist areas before attempting to find a meal at some trendy place on Duval Street. Regrettably we passed on Margaritaville ending up with yet another mediocre but relatively expensive meal down the street from there. We did however, stop in at the Green Parrot Bar for a couple of drinks and so liked their motto, "No Sniveling", that we bought a bumper sticker and t-shirt while there.
Key West is very picturesque with lots of chickens and cats running around. The roosters are particularly colorful...
... and the cats can sit patiently awaiting the perfect opportunity for something to munch on, or maybe just trying to decide what to have...
Thursday we headed back to Miami amid a rather heavy rain storm. We have driven in snowy white out conditions at home but this was a first to drive in such a heavy rain that it was the equivalent of a white out. It really came down just as we hit the seven mile bridge where we could barely see the taillights of the car in front of us. It was a bit weird being on that long bridge with so little visibility ahead although we were able to see the bright lightening overhead...hmmm, not many things taller than the average car out there in the middle of the water but no choice but to keep going.
It's been awhile since our car was that clean, even with the remains of the many love bugs etched into the front. We decided to stay at the same Miami Everglades RV Resort where we had stayed earlier in the week, and it appears, that we may have been adopted by "campground kitty" as she is known...
Friday was a car oil change etc day so pretty laid back. Took the car into a Nissan dealer where they recommended not only an oil change but also a coolant flush along with both front and rear differentials flushed. So that took a couple of hours but now they are done. Later in the early to mid afternoon we drove into Miami to a shopping center. While inside, the skies opened again and we had to wait out a tremendous downpour. When we got back to the campground we found we had left open a couple of windows on the wee trailer and our bedding got a tad damp so off to the laundry we went. We had a basin sitting on the picnic table and it had over 4 inches of water in it, so that's an idea of just how much rain there had been. We decided that even with the damp bedding we were lucky because Kris had decided to close the overhead fan before we went out!
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