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We picked up our hire car a Honda Civic and started our 3 hour drive to Miami which was rather uneventful until.....Little did we know that in typical American style, some guy called the Vice-President of the USA decided that he would be leaving South Beach Miami via car the same time that Leah and I were arriving. This meant that the roads were completely closed and that we had to sit in yet another car park for the next hour and 15mins. After being 'totally wowed' by this exprience, after finding our way through all the traffic we finally made it to our hotel and settled in. Leah was keen to just relax so I set out to take our hire car back and drop it off as we didn't want to pay $26USD for a carpark overnight and seeing as everything was in walking distance of our hotel we didn't need the car anymore. So I asked the porter where the closest Alamo car rental is and he told me it was a couple of blocks up the street and that I wouldn't have any problems walking back to the hotel. So I set out to for the Car rental return only to find out that he had given me the wrong car rental group(Avis). Seeing we still had until tomorrow to return the car I went for a quick drive down the main strip of South Beach and checked it out before heading back to the hotel to google where the real Alamo car rental return place is. So jump back in the car and start driving to Alamo which I've now learnt is up the other end of the beach, so I park the car in the garage (paid parking) only to come out and find that Alamo car hire is closed for the day. So I caught a taxi back to our apartment feeling a little annoyed that I'd have to make yet another taxi trip out to alamo again in the morning, at least this time I'd know where it was. I made it back to our apartment and we decided it was time for dinner, we had earlier spotted a Greek Restaurant that was situated just down the street that looked good for some food. Once downstairs we noticed that it was happy hour the bar at our hotel and they were giving away some free drinks (just had to tip the barman) So after a quick free drink we walked down the street and across the road for a really nice meal. Feeling rather shattered after our drive we headed back to hotel to hit the hay.
The next day we planned to make the quick trip to Alamo, then off to the post office to send a package home, eat some breakfast to then finally hit the beach. So we packed all our stuff and caught the taxi, quickly handed the keys over to Alamo, then headed to the dreaded post office. After our last experience at the post office in New York we thought we'd be best to send just one big box instead of a heap of smaller ones as the paper work is just too much! So picked out a big box and packed it full of our stuff, and then after filling out everything we remembered was appropriate still had to spend another 20mins in the teller sorting it all out. Hunger pains in my stomach had finally started to set in so we headed in the direction of the beach on foot, to try and find an cafe or restaurant for breaky. We took a look at one place but found it not up to scratch so we headed in the other direction to find an Irish Pub that looked busy and sweet. Lets just say breakfast was Amazing! The best pieces of French Toast I've ever had. After filling our tummies it was time for the beach!
We rocked up at the beach feeling pretty good as it had been a while since we'd had the chance to grab some sun and chill. Our first impressions of South Beach Miami was very much a beach like Surfers, 'cept it doesn't have any surf and the sand is much more coarse but at least the water is crystal clear. The weather was hot as so Leah and I decided to hire an umbrella and a couple deck chairs to laze on. After our lazing in the sun and going for a few swims, we noticed some big black clouds starting to come over, considering it was now around 2pm we were rather hungry for some lunch (OK maybe it was only me that was rather hungry), as the clouds were closing quick we decided the best place to go was back to the Irish Pub =p it was close and offered good food and shelter. =D After another delicious meal we decided to hang around for couple of drinks as the rain was hammering down. After it settled we decided to catch a taxi home in case it would start pouring again. Once home and freshened up we decided to head back our apartment to chill, the rain was still on and off so we decided to have a quiet night in, except for another quick takeaway run from the same Greek place the night before.
Our third day in Miami Leah and I decided to do a little shopping, there's a massive mall in South Beach Miami and I needed a pair of euro togs for our Bahama cruise, as we had noticed the day before the half the population wears them and thought it'd be a bit of fun to join in. Besides how on earth was I going to try and reinact Daniel Craig walking out of the Bahamian water if I didn't have a pair of euro togs =p (important word try) First though was breakfast, as the Irish pub was too far to walk we decided to eat at the in-house restaurant, which was.... ok, nothing too special. So off we go down the mall which is really huge and full of people, shops and restaurants.
We looked all up and down the mall, enjoyed some ice cream and a chocolate dipped marshmellow caremel thing(All I can say is they were both tasted devine!) we finally came across my pair of Euro Togs, without trying them on I purchased them and we headed home to try them on and relax as legs were tired from walking all day. Lucky for me the euro togs were a perfect fit! =D For dinner we were both craving some Italian so we looked up a nice Italian Restaurant online and found the best one wasback in the Mall so we headed back down and ate some really nice pizza and pasta and walked back to our hotel feeling satisfied.
Today was our last in Miami, so made sure everything was packed and headed down to the habour around midday, as that's when we could board the ship that didn't set sail till 5pm. Lucky we did as before we hopped in the taxi we made sure it had a credit card facility, little did we know that it was out of order, and as we didn't have much cash on us we then had to try and find an ATM down the habour, something you'd think quite simple, yet the first one we found wasn't working and so I ended up having to ask the cabbie to wait while I went into the habour shops to find an atm. Fortunately there was one there that worked, so after an adventure in the cab we finally made our way on to our ship.
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