A comfortable night in the apartment saw us all up early again today. Well before 9am we decided to walk the short distance to Miami North Beach before it got too hot.
The beach itself was characterised by lots of seaweed by the high tide line, something we had seen all along the East Coast. As we sat on the beach, two tractors were doing their best to try and clear it away. A somewhat thankless task. Because of the early hour there were not many people about, so apart from the occasional tractor noise it was very peaceful.
We didn’t have any chairs with us and neither were there any to hide so we plonked ourselves onto the beach. After about 20 minutes, my back started complaining as it usually does. I am much more tuned into it these days and decided to try and walk the pain off. My back never likes being in unusual positions (for me) for too long. I walked along the beach towards Trump Towers and back again. I tried sitting back down with Karen & Neil but only lasted another 15 minutes before I went for a walk to the pier in the other direction.
By now we were all feeling frazzled. And so we decided to walk back via any Starbucks within a 10 mile radius. Fortunately it was only half a block away, and the air con was a welcome relief. Neil was as usual not impressed. He told Karen that she had used up her one permitted coffee stop for the holiday on his first day.
We were also dismayed to find that City had lost 5 -1. A poor end to a poor season.
Instead of going back to the room we headed to the swimming pool. It had a few people in it. Karen & I soaked in the bath like Jacuzzi before I tried the pool itself which was like Goldilocks porridge – not too hot and not too cold.
After a quick shower and some snacks in the room we headed down to the car and drove to South Beach. The challenge we had when arriving was finding somewhere to park. We ended up paying $40 – yes $40!! I’m not sure my first car cost that much. I reasoned though that we could hardly come to this iconic place and not actually get out of the car. It was very busy and it was a hot sunny Sunday afternoon.
We strolled along Ocean Drive. Well to be more accurate we melted along Ocean Drive, happy to find shade to walk in. From here we walked 0.7 miles to the Lincoln Street Mall, which is the main pedestrianised shopping street and very pleasant it was too. We had yet another Starbucks stop that even Neil was grateful to get a cold drink. Irresponsibly I managed to leave the rucksack on the back of the chair I was sitting in, cue a frantic run back to the store after we had gone a 100 metres further down the street.
From here we drove back to The Cheesecake Factory for our evening meal. It always amuses me when we choose to sit outside because it is warmer than sitting inside with the cold air con. We were all very hungry having eating very little during the day and Karen and Neil also both ordered cheesecakes to take back with us to eat in the apartment.
