DRIVE TO MIAMI
Days 56-66
I did mention earlier that Sara had been planning, in secret, a change to our plans. It fact she had been planning a diversion to The Galapagos islands, by way of Cartagena in Colombia, Bogota, Quito in Ecuador and then the Galapagos, and then back to Miami. Quiet a detour I hear you exclaim!
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Well the planning was carried out, advice was sought, it was all apparently do-able, but the powers that be (actually Sara) decided that too many flights were involved with too much mask wearing and too many airport queues at too many borders - so we (she) went back to square one, with just some tweaks.
The plan now was to hire a car for 10 days and drive the 1,000 plus miles from New Orleans to Miami along the coast road doing some beachy locations along the way (ROAD-TRIP 2!!). Then jump aboard the Norwegian Encore cruise liner for a 'BOOZE, FOOD & CLUBBING week round the Caribbean, then fly to Nassau in The Bahamas for a 'BEACH' week before flying home from Nassau itself (Virgin kindly changed our flights, which originally departed Jamaica, to allow us to board in Nassau where it touches down, no hassle and at no cost, we even got a refund).
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So we deliberately booked a big luxurious sedan road-trip car this time, a Chevrolet Impala, no idea where to drive too exactly, just aiming to drive in comfort for say four hours on the Interstate and then drop down to the coast for a couple of days, then do the same again, four times.
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Uber to the car rental office at the airport, big, big queues, not looking good. No cars. No idea why. Three hours later and no car in sight. Despite having booked the biggest car of the trip so far - we ended up with the smallest car of the trip so far. We literally pounced on the first car off the line which wasn't even a Compact, it was a bloody Sub-Compact!!! To be honest even a sub-compact in the 'land of lard' is about the size of Range Rover Sport, so the only complaint was that we could have booked these throughout our travels and been no worse off driving-wise, but a lot richer.
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DAY 1-3 DESTIN - So off we set, but where to? Well the first stop had been recommended by the bus driver to my Air Boat no less. He said "Go to Destin, I like it". So we went to Destin. Running three hours late for a 300 mile drive and in gathering darkness we fired up Airbnb and had a nerve wracking hour trying to find somewhere to stay.
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The problem being that it's the start of Spring Break when thousands of young folk descend on the warmer south coast. Prices are high but Sara finds a cracking apartment just back from the beach and we have a lovely three nights chilling, biking, sunning. Lovely friendly people everywhere. Everyone says 'hi' or 'good day' every time we pass. I actually start to think they see me as I really am - someone special! - until I see they do it to everyone. It puts a smile on your face. Even drivers are so polite, if you even look at the roadway they stop, just in case you might want to cross. Daren't even look at a nice house over the road as suddenly all the traffic in both directions has slammed on their anchors and are smiling at me and gesturing politely for me to cross. I can't not cross, it would look silly, so I cross. Look back for Sara ,,,,,,,,, and here we go again. Screech, wave, cross, repeat. But kudos to my bus driver - he knew his stuff. Destin was delightful, especially the sand.
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Above is our tiny car and our lovely apartment, us and our bikes and a typical Destin street scene. Mostly private beaches with no access, interspersed with public beaches and the whitest, whitest and softest sand ever. Walking on it you would actually think it was snow it was so white, soft, and crunchy the way only new fallen snow is. It's just a lot hotter than real snow. Needless to say we both got sun burn.
Cycled 18 miles through beautifully manicured streets in blazing sunshine feeling that everything was right with the world. Left Sara sunbathing on the beach. Went to a bar and bought a pint of beer - for $14 (£10.40)!!!! World stopped. Quickly collected Sara and we went to the supermarket and bought beers to drink at home in our lovely apartment instead...... How do 'spring-breakers' ever afford it????
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To be honest we prefer self catering. It is not the money (although every bill is $100 when you add on 20-25% tip, even just a snack and a couple of beers). It is being able to eat normal, healthy food at your own pace that becomes important. Love Airbnb!
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DAY 4-5 MADISON - Off again and this time we head inland to Madison on the border with Georgia. Total change of pace. Beautiful Antebellum (it means pre Civil War since you ask) houses under the shade of massive Live Oaks draped in Spanish Moss, big wide streets, sleepy townships, driving through thousands and thousands of acres of pine trees on the big Plantations in the area. We wander round lovely warm villages (alone, nobody on the streets, locals just stare at us through their car windows, no-one walks anywhere here). Drive on some minor roads until we realise that in South Georgia they don't bother with tarmac off the main roads, very quaint. Stayed a couple of nights at a lovely Bed & Breakfast run by a dear elderly Caribbean lady who did us proud with gourmet breakfasts.
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DAY 6-9 COCOA BEACH - Off again for another four hour drive, this time to Cocoa Beach near Cape Canaveral. I did the booking for this one. I felt we had missed out on not booking a camper van (RV) for our desert road trip - so I booked one for four nights here. Much to the concern of my travelling partner. Fortunately for me it turned out OK. You can tell by the pose below.
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I just think it is so funny. Talk about how the mighty have fallen. Look at us - Trailer Trash!!
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It rocks as you walk around, the rain drummed on the roof last night, its dead scruffy, but I love it. It's such a down home feel and the area is lovely, shame about us camping on the roadside bringing the tone down.
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Whilst our RV was lovely and funny at the same time, the weather was not on our side, being the first time we had been troubled by clouds or rain for then best part of two months. So we attended to our admin. Sara did her laundry, went clothes shopping and dyed her hair. I went to the Kennedy Space Centre (and washed one pair of pants before I left, just to show willing). We also checked out the beaches and bars, which for such a well-known and relatively expensive resort were sadly a bit down market.
Anyway, time for a day of rockets and history, and what a history! The Kennedy Space Centre at Cape Canaveral (as opposed to the Canaveral Space Centre at Cape Kennedy, they swopped the names back in 1973 because the local Canaveralonians were pissed off about the Kennedy name being imposed on in 1963 them by LBJ). Being in my teens in the 60’s I was there for a lot of it, but I did not recall facts such as the first American in space (in 1961) went up strapped on the top of a very lightly converted Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile, a nuke! Then, while watching a video of the six Apollo missions from 1969-72, what struck me most was the fun they all had on the moon. The astronauts were literally running, jumping, singing, kicking space rocks, pissing about racing in the space rover – I mean they really had a ball. Can you imagine an astronaut mucking about on the upcoming Artimis (sister of Apollo) mission to return to the moon? Rolling a big rock down a moon-hill while singing a daft song??? It is just not going to happen. Saluting the flag while jumping four feet in the air and giggling?? Great guys, great days, nothing ‘woke’ in those days. They were just brave guys with a sense of purpose – AND A SENSE OF HUMOUR.
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The next day was Sara’s idea. She suggested we drove to Orlando to watch the new Batman film at the Imaxx 4D cinema. Damn odd thinks I, not her normal idea of a fun outing. No matter, I climb behind the wheel and off we trot, to a shopping complex. A two and a half hour shopping detour. Nicely played darling. The film itself was amazing (amazingly dark, boring, plotless and weird). The 4D was CRAZY! No 3D glasses (I did go back out and ask for my 3D glasses and the guy just smiled and explained that 3D was three dimensions, 4D was just one dimension, but that dimension was the FOURTH, with added bouncing seats, water sprays, air jets, volume so loud I had to turn my hearing aids to off). We sat there giggling like schoolgirls as we were literally thrown from the seats, soaked, deafened and pummelled for almost three hours. Excellent value. Several broken ribs later we returned to our trailer.
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The shots above show the older rockets that they used to make astronauts sit atop of, quite incredible how dangerous it must have been.
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It was incredible being up close and personal to the space shuttle, I drove miles in the 70's to see it land at Stanstead on the back of a 747.
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Then the SATURN V rocket that powered the moon landings was simply awe inspiring in its sheer size.
As a child of the 60's it was great to see these things and to recall their amazing achievements whilst carrying more computer power in my pocket than they had for the whole mission.
DAY 10-11 - ONWARD TO JUPITER - This was to visit a very, very old friend of Sara’s who had emigrated to the USA. Lorna was a great mate and lived on our route south in the town of Jupiter, just north of Palm Beach. Jupiter is nice, very expensive, nice people, same issues as the rest of Florida with everything being flat and spread out, but it did have proper trendy bars and independent restaurants on the waterfront aplenty. And we visited loads of them. Sadly, Lorna’s husband had recently passed away but she managed to be the perfect host. Massive house, seen above. Her son Alex (24, ex-SVS) is a pro caddy at Admirals Cove Golf Club. A mere $220,000 to join and just $80,000 a year, makes you wonder what they offer for that money……… On the day we arrived a member had parked his car on Alex’s foot for about 60 seconds causing extreme pain and suffering, and did not even apologise, just blamed Alex and drove off. Try doing that in the UK.
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DAY 12 - MIAMI AND OUR CRUISE - Drive the last 100 miles to the airport, drop off the car having clocked another 1,400 miles. That clocks up a total of 3,500 miles driven between Costa Rica (800), and then 1,300 from Las Vegas to Denver and 1,400 New Orleans to Miami, basically coast to coast in the USA. All without a scratch or a drama bigger than Sara going “LOOK OOOOUT!!!” occasionally. Then to some weird location for yet another Covid Test to allow us on the good ship Lollipop.