It is a Friday night and I cannot go out because it’s
snowing. So, I thought I would catch up with my blog since I have been
neglecting it terribly for the last few weeks. I have done a great many exciting
things since the last time I posted anything, so hang in there and if like me
you have nothing to do on a Friday night, grab your mug of steamy hot
chocolate, a huge bowl of chocolate ice cream and a chair and read away. Or
anything chocolate for that matter. I hope I provide some sort of entertainment
for you tonight.
So we ended off the road trip saga in Key West, Florida. I
have one more fascinating destination to tell you about before I can close off
that chapter. This blog takes place in the unbelievable city of Miami, Florida.
A place where the party, literally, never stops.
Having spent a really fun, lazy day in Key West, we took a
rather slow drive up to Miami. Slow because the fastest you could drive at any
one time was 50 mph and that was if no cops were in the nearby vicinity. We
arrived in Miami and made our way straight to our hostel, because I was a
grumpy person and Kevin was almost on his deathbed. The one great thing about
America is that most major cities number their streets, so when you’re
navigating your way through unfamiliar territory at least you can kind of feel
like you have some semblance of hope that you know what you’re doing. So the
hostel was on 9th and Something Street, this would make it easy,
especially for someone like me who needs things to be made very simple. I am
driving and I find the numbers and I count along in my head, just making extra
careful. There I go, 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 10. Something wasn’t quite right there. So
I turn around and start again. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 10. Not right again. They say
third times the charm so one more time. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 10. Somehow I just knew
I should have listened during those math lessons, but well too late now. Eventually,
in his near death state, Kevin wakes up, relieves me of the horrendous task of
driving and manages to find the street, the 9th one. If you’re lucky
with numbers, you’re lucky with numbers.
One thing I have to say about Miami though is that hostel
are certainly not for the fate of heart. If you go there expecting a place with
a comfy bed, noise free, personal space and a clean bathroom, you would have
better luck booking in at the $1000 a night, 5 star hotel down the road. It was
my first time ever in a hostel, and to say the least it was like a huge cultural
shock. Almost like packing my bags, flying way over the ocean and living in
another country with no familiar face. It was almost that bad. While it is an
awesome place to meet people from all over the world, I met some girls from
Russia who were probably here competing for world’s tallest human, a guy from
Cambodia who spoke better English then an English speaking person, and someone
from Germany who wasn’t too sure what country he was from. The bathrooms were a
place you entered and didn’t judge too closely anything you found that slightly
resembled a foreign specie. In order to keep your sanity about you, just go in
there do what needs to be done and leave. That is the only way to survive.
Miami is this place where they have the most amazing
specials. Being the shop obsessed individual I am, I cannot under any
circumstances pass up a bargain. It would go against everything I stand for in
life. But these “amazing specials” tended to drift towards the more adult
beverages. A special is a special, I was not about to let this one pass me by.
So after huge cocktails and recovery sessions on the beach, it was time to make
our way back to yet another hostel, this time we had our own room, to get ready
for a night out on the town. Now the main building for the International Hostel
is but three blocks away from where we were staying. Keep that in mind, three
blocks. We go there to make our reservations for the night and then walk over
to our apartment style hostel. Well, Kevin and I made it there anyway. I spent
an hour getting myself ready for the night, and still managed to watch a movie
and helped some poor lost traveler from Brazil, or was it Spain? I cannot
remember, try find his friends who abandoned him at the airport. So three hours
later and there I see Shaii and Kate walking down the street, with a huge
bottle of water and rationing off a chocolate bar like their lives depended
upon it. What had happened to them you may ask? They too got lost somewhere
between the three blocks they had to walk from the main hostel to where we were
staying. I’m still trying to wrap my mind around the fact that they walked in
one continuous circle for three hours. I think after the first 10 minutes I
would have been bored. But kudos to them for persevering the way they did.
Miami was really great. We didn't just spend our time on
half priced cocktails and shaking our booties in clubs. We managed to see a
little more than that. We saw the amazing beach, went on a boat cruise around
the harbor and got to ogle celebrity houses and ended off our time with an insanely
delicious meal at a very fancy restaurant. So, go to Miami all you young at
heart and if you feel especially brave go try out a hostel, it will be sure to
change your world.
Safe travels!
