Florida USA: Fairchild Tropical Garden

Our last day in Florida was the Thursday. We had a leisurely breakfast at the hotel – keeping to the “continental” style of breads/bagels, cheese and fruit rather than the “full American”.

We then checked out of the hotel, checked in (online) for our flight and set out to drive to Miami. There were long queues to get into southern Miami because of road works.

We went to visit the Fairchild Tropical Garden. Partly because my mother likes gardening – and we do too, but also because it offered a tram ride round the place and shouldn’t take too long to visit! It claims to be the largest Tropical Garden in the world. It’s pretty big, but we’re not sure how it compares with Kew Gardens and The Eden Project in the UK.

We walked a little way together along the very pleasant path, then Mum went off to wait for the tram by the lake side and we carried on for a few more minutes before joining her.

We then had an enjoyable tram ride together. There was an informative talk from the volunteer guide as we went round the park. She pointed out the art works on display as well as the plants and other interesting features.

Many of the plants had been damaged by recent cold weather and had brown leaves or had shed them completely.

In addition to the plants we were lucky to catch sight of Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster who both seem to be resident at the park. Other residents included birds and at least one turtle.

 

 

After the tram tour we needed a drink, but the only cafe was some distance away up a slight hill (yes, there is a hill in Florida). One of the volunteer guides used her radio to call for help, and we were soon on our way to visit the cafe in a little electric cart driven by another volunteer.

After our drinks (tropical fruit juice sodas of course) we spoke to another volunteer about getting back. She offered to call for help again, but suggested we tour the orchid house while we waited.

The cart arrived soon after we emerged from looking at the orchids and we were soon back at the main entrance.

We then drove back into Miami, looking for the car rental place to return the car. My satnav took us to a random street in downtown Miami – which was a bit worrying especially as my friend Bob had said the day before that there were places in Miami that he didn’t like to get lost in. We wanted 3901 SW 28th Street. Later analysis suggested it had taken us to 390 SW 28th Street.

I put the address in again and it directed us through a maze of side streets and light industrial areas until we arrived at the Budget Car Rental facility. All a bit stressful!

We checked the car in, which took only about 10 minutes and got on the bus to the airport. The driver forgot to ask us which airline we needed so we missed our stop for Virgin Atlantic and had to go round again!

We dropped our bags and then the special assistance arrived in the form of a wheelchair and handler to take Mum to the gate. She was taken all the way to the plane door: after we’d had a brief break for a burger and a Panini – which was all there was to eat in the departure lounge.

The flight was uneventful, but on arriving at Heathrow our taxi took a few minutes to reach us. That was partly because it took a few minutes for the messages he had left for me on my mobile phone to get to me.

Florida USA: Fort Lauderdale: beaches, art and steak house dining

On 16th February we went to Fort Lauderdale.

This was Shrove Tuesday as well, so on the way we stopped at a diner in Weston where I was able to get my "fix" of pancakes (with eggs, bacon, etc. etc.).

After initially parking in downtown Fort Lauderdale and walking a brief way along Las Olas Boulevard we decided that it would be too much for my mother to manage to walk to the beach – she has angina – so we went back to the car and drove to a car park by the beach. I was asked by a visitor from Alabama how to pay for the car parking.

We then walked on the beach a little way, and then sat enjoying the view. We left mum sitting on the sand and went for a stroll, stopping for the world’s most expensive smoothie on the way. While drinking my smoothie I was asked to take a photo for a couple of German tourists.

We then drove back along Las Olas Boulevard to the Fort Lauderdale Art Museum. We parked just around the corner and went in. The ground floor was closed as an exhibit had ended that weekend and the new one was setting up so we were allowed in for free – possibly because there was only a couple of hours left until closing too!

There was some frankly odd art from the CoBrA school (artists from Copenhagen, Brussels and Amsterdam), but I did enjoy the rest of it. Some great stuff by Andy Warhol and other “names” like Tracey Emin in an exhibit called “with you I want to live” as well as a wing devoted to the American artist William Glackens.

We had a chat with the security guard as we left. His wife was from Norwich, England. They met on the beach at Fort Lauderdale 20+ years ago! He recognised our accents and wanted to know if we knew Norwich.

Back at the hotel we had dinner in the Ireland’s Steak House restaurant with my daughter’s new “in-laws” plus my two youngest. The food was great (and expensive to match) but the service was lacking. We were 10 minutes late getting to the restaurant and they had given our (reserved) table to someone else. This was despite me asking for an 8 o’clock table and being told they could not take us until 8:45. I had to pursaude them to take us at 8:30, we arrived at 8:40. They then said we’d have to wait for 10 minutes for a table so we sat in the bar drinking bloody mary’s. The ten minute wait for a table turned into half an hour. It then took them 30 minutes to take our order and another 30+ minutes to serve it. So it was now 10:15 and we had all eaten loads of bread. The restaurant was nearly empty anyway.

Lots of silly frippery in the restaurant – like different types of salt for different courses/entrees, loads of different types of bread and different types of butter for each one. They offered a 36 ounce steak as well – which they said we could share if we wanted. I found the 8 ounce was just fine. My mother and daughter had the halibut – causing some amusement, my daughter had never encountered “hali – butt” before.

I also hated the way the server kept interrupting our conversation to tell us about the menu choices or whatever. I appreciate they need to do their job, but butting into our conversation is just not acceptable to me.

I see from this review http://findlocal.sun-sentinel.com/weston/restaurants/steaks/irelands-steakhouse-at-the-hyatt-regency-bonaventure-weston-restaurant that other diners have had a similar experience to us recently. One of the reviews seems a little TOO good – maybe written by a member of staff? I also see online that they are advertising for a new maitre d’ – I think they may need one!

Florida USA: The Day After The Wedding

On the day after the wedding we took my mother and my middle child on a trip to the Florida Keys. We didn’t go all the way to Key West. We stopped at Islamorada. We went to the “Theater of the Sea” there. They have displays by sea lions and dolphins as well as turtles, parrots, iguanas, sharks and alligators.

Sea Lion

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Stroking a (very small) shark

An egret on a pole

After enjoying the displays we went on to the Hurricane Memorial, but everyone refused to get out of the car to see it any closer than the parking bay next to it. We then went on down a side road until we could see the sea.

The beach we reached was presumably private, but we didn’t do anything other than walk down to the water’s edge and take a few pictures. The sea was dead calm. The sand was fine and white, it looked like the Caribbean.

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We then drove back north. However we wanted to experience more of the Keys. I suggested that the Keys were famous for Key Lime Pie so we should stop and try some. We reached a place called the “Key Lime Store” outside Key Largo. This was really fun and kitsch but did not have anywhere where we could sit and eat Key Lime Pie. A few miles further on we came to a lovely little traditional US diner called DJ’s on the overseas highway 1 where we got slice of Key Lime Pie to share and coffee (daughter had a HUGE brownie instead of the pie). This place was clean and quiet, service was excellent too. While in Key Largo we were amused by the signs directing us to “The Church of God” – we wondered WHICH god they were referring to.

We then drove back to Weston, stopping at “Chili’s” for our evening meal.

Florida USA: Wedding Day

Beautiful weather on the day of the wedding. We spent the morning exploring the Hyatt Regency Bonaventure hotel.

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Then I had to put on my suit. This was fine, but the tie was a clip on and the collar was much too tight. My wife had to tug to get the clip done up.

Off to the venue up the road for the wedding itself. Yes, her husband is in the US Army. He is on 2 weeks R&R for the wedding and is then back to Afghanistan for several months.

Florida USA: travel and breakfast

We went over to Florida last week for my eldest daughter’s wedding. This was held on February 14th (Valentine’s Day).

The flight out – on Friday 12th February was eventful. We were delayed on departure and then just before we were due to land we were told that due to storms affecting Fort Lauderdale and Miami we were being told to hold off landing for a couple of hours. The captain then said we didn’t have enough fuel to last a couple of hours so we were off to The Bahamas.

We landed at Nassau and were not allowed off the plane. I called the hotel to let them know we were delayed. I couldn’t get through to the car rental office and I left a message for my daughter who was supposed to be meeting us at the hotel at 8 pm. They refuelled the plane after an hour and 45 minutes and we then set off again, swinging wide to avoid the storm as it came towards Nassau so the flight took more like an hour and a half rather than the 50 minutes we were promised.

We landed at Miami about 11 pm – having been due in at about 5:15 pm. We arrived at the car rental office at midnight and had to queue for an hour to pick up the car. We then drove away… I thought north, but it turned out to be south. So we had to turn around and head back. We then picked up the I-95 heading North.

I may have been a bit tired but we missed the exit we wanted, so we ended up taking the I-75 back south. Having driven around looking for the hotel I remembered that my mobile phone had satnav “Ovi Maps” on it. I turned it on, it picked up the satellites – eventually - and directed us to the hotel. We would never have found it without.

The next morning we met up with my daughter, her fiancé, his mother, his half sister and his half sister’s friend for a proper American breakfast in a diner. After two pancakes, bacon, sausage links, eggs (sunny side up), coffee and toast I started to feel human again.

We then headed over to Sawgrass Mills to get some shoes: my wife had sent a pair off to be dyed to match her dress, but they had got lost at the dyer. So we had a hectic hour or so visiting shoes shops before we found a pair that were the right colour and fitted her. Miracles do happen!

We met up again with the fiancé's family at the wedding venue (Bonaventure Golf and Country Club in Weston) for the rehearsal.

That evening we went to my daughter’s new mother-in-law to-be’s house for a meal.