Reflections of My Travel

We left Orlando around 08:30 this morning with my sissy and brother-in-law (BIL) on our way to south Florida.  We took our time a made a few stops along the turnpike before arriving at Holiday Park in the Ft Lauderdale area.  We joined several other tourists on an airboat tour of the Everglades

pretty much the same as ours

where we managed to catch two alligators hanging out in the swamp,

first gator

second gator

an osprey roosting in a tree,

osprey

a couple of large iguanas sunning on the tree limbs (hardly visible in my pix), and other wildlife. 

birdies

vultures

I’ve never been on an airboat so it was a fun new experience.  Especially when the pilot picked up speed and drifted around corners… what a great ride! 

it was pretty out there

Considering it was a cool and windy day, I think we were very lucky to have made so many wildlife sightings.  After the airboat, they had a quick gator show

big mommas

look mom, no hands!

and then we were on our way to lunch.  Once we had enjoyed a bit of sustenance, we made our way south to check out Miami’s South Beach. Now, of course, I have to compare to my backyard (which I miss very much). The South Beach sand is much denser than ours in that you sink into our sand when you walk on it but the Miami sand stayed solid beneath our feet. It was also a courser and slightly darker sand and the beach itself was far wider than ours. The water was a nice shade of teal, not very different from ours, and had bigger waves, being the Atlantic and all. I also appreciated the well maintained activity trail that runs along the beach. We probably walked a mile or so along the water’s edge

sissy, BIL, hubby, and the shadow of my head

sissy trying out the water

sissy and BIL strolling along south beach

either an intense argument or a romantic mating ritual, hard to say

and then took the street route back toward the car so that we could appreciate the local flavor of the architecture.

fun stairs

i would love to get inside the top of that turret and look around

neat looking building

there she waves

Instead of hotels and condos, the ocean front is reserved for high-end restaurants (across the street, nothing beach-side). The restaurants had sidewalk seating so we fully experienced the unique ambiance of each restaurant, all thoroughly impressive. We, however, headed back to Ft Lauderdale to check into our hotel, get changed, and grab dinner there. Tomorrow, we cruise!