After a short 45 minute flight delay on Thursday, we arrived in Miami Airport mid afternoon, collected our car and headed toward Miami Beach. Only about a 20 min drive, the first challenge was what to do with the car! No car park for the Hotel so you are pretty much forced to hand it over to the Valet parking guys for the priviledge of $24 for 24 hours. We are staying right on Ocean Drive at the Colony Hotel, one of the original Art Deco hotels of the area. Nice clean room although a little bit of a squeeze with 2 double futon style beds!
After a wander around South Beach and a visit down to the sea, we headed west away from the front to find some food. Nice mediteranean style restaurants were to be found down Espanola Way - we ate at an Italian called Hosteria Romana - Good food and friendly staff. Time for a bit more wandering and a few drinks on the front before calling it a night - I had got to the tired and clumsy stage, nearly knocking over my drinks!
Yesterday was spent exploring South Beach. After breakfast at the News Cafe, we started off exploring. We quickly found out that it was actually Art Deco weekend. An annual event put on by the Miami Design Preservation League. We were going to do a Walking tour with them anyway but as it was a special weekend, their timing was a little later than usual. Nowhere in advance had we found any mention of this weekend however it did explain the lots of small vendors tents that had started to appear along the front!. Before the tour, we wandered toward Lincoln Way Mall - the pedestrianised shopping Mall of the area. The Art Deco style continues in this area with large colourful sculptures and constructions. We did manage to discover the Apple Store - Art Deco Style :-). The tour was supposed to be 90 mins but in reality was 2 hours 20mins! Very informative and she managed to keep everyone's attention. It involved walking around the areas of South Beach and actually going into the lobby's of some of the hotels and buildings. Very impressive and we'd recommend the tour as a good way to get some of the understanding of the Art Deco style and era.
Given we only had the one full day in the area, we decided to jump in the car and drive over to Coral Gables and the Venetian Pool. Bit chilly but we did spent about 90 mins there enjoying the location and going for a swim! Next we headed over toward downtown Miami, parked the car and jumped on the MetroMover. This is a free train type service that links all the downtown Miami Areas and is an easy way to see some of the sights. Lots and lots of building sites and a few very impressive looking buildings. Think Canary Wharf but bigger :-).
We then drove back to the hotel to spend the evening enjoying the Art Deco Weekend Parade, the various stalls and a few bottles purchased from the Mini Market. After a quick burger at Jonny Rocket's, we met up with Adam and Collette for a few drinks then carried on back toward the hotel stopping along the way at another restaurant/bar that had a fantastic Live Sax player. Next stop, Florida Keys! ...
Steve Seymour January 13th, 2007 12:24:19