Bienvenidos a Meeami!

Scott wrote about the visit with Kyle and Rebecca this week past and lightly touched on our visit to Miami (“Meeami” as it’s pronounced in “Little Havana” a la Gloria Estefan and Will Smith). Most are familiar with Miami’s spectacular water vista of immense downtown buildings studded with large cruise ships behind the backdrop of palm trees and 24/7 salsa music.

Northbound to Miami - boats leaving the Boat Show!

Miami also has the dubious honour of having one of the highest crime rates in the country. A fellow boater we met at the Palm Bay Marina - Greg Penny from Cornerbrook, Nfld if you please - mused that the crime show “First 48 hours” frequently films a mere 20 blocks from our marina! I don’t mind telling you, I was a little nervous leaving the grounds to “explore”. We learned pretty quickly in American cities, if the locals tell you “you don’t need to go there” you heed their advice and stick to the beaten track.

The Palm Bay marina itself was a real jewel in the city. Located just north of the Miami downtown area, it was full of the usual amenities and staffed with welcoming, knowledgeable and very helpful individuals. Bill, our Dockmaster, readily offered to do a quick grocery run for us, recognizing we had teenagers on board. The pool was a great bonus! However, we wanted to explore the actual city.

Lovely view from the pool

 So, on Friday, we headed out at the crack of 1:00 pm to explore Miami Beach and to see about taking in a Miami Heat NBA Basketball game at the American Airlines Arena in downtown Miami – remember now, we were with teenagers and that was a reasonably early start for them. Life on a boat means no car, so you walk everywhere. But our first stop was 10 km away, so we decided to brave public transportation and took the bus. The concept was simple, but the execution left a little to be desired. Mental note here: buy an Easy Card. Suffice it to say, we found ourselves walking across the Venetian Bridge towards Miami Beach and hailing a cab. Long story!

Despite the transportation foibles, I was most impressed by how friendly and welcoming both the cab and bus drivers were, and how clean everything looked. The cabs and buses smelled “neutral” (best you can hope for there) and ran fairly smoothly. I was especially intrigued by how the buses integrated the seating for persons requiring wheelchairs, and how the system operated fairly seamlessly.

Long story short, we enjoyed a wonderful walk on the famous Miami Beach (home of the Golden Girls for you 80’s trivia people) and watched a few cruise ships make their way out of Government cut (main channel out of Miami Port). If you look closely, you’ll see that small boat accompanying the cruiser is a Coast Guard boat with a submachine gun pointed at anything coming towards the ship! Interesting?!

View from the Boardwalk inland at Miami Beach condos

Lots of cruise ships leaving Government Cut from Miami Port to other ports of paradise

Look at the front of that boat! Oh my!

Our attention then turned to those Heat tickets. Sold out! But, for $40 you could stand in general admission for 3 hours and watch the game with your binoculars or on the jumbotron with a thousand of your closest friends. This is as close as we got to watching the game. So, we headed out in search of ice cream. That’s the thing about boating life. Never get too hung up on a plan – there’s always something else you can do instead, so you move on....to ice cream!

Closest we got to seeing LeBron James :( faces

I can find a sunset picture anywhere - downtown Miami

Beautiful Opera House in downtown Miami