USA Holiday 2, September 30 (I'm In Miami B*tch)

Had to get up at 5:30am for the plane to Miami. Looking back, I probably booked some of these flights an hour or two early - not so much my fault as it is the amount of time the public transport and getting through the airport requires. We left for the same bus stop by 6:00am and no less than 5 taxi drivers pulled over as we were waiting, to ask if we needed a ride - what service! Actually it's probably because noone is on the street as 6:00am as you might have guessed.

Strangely we had to go through a whole bunch of custom checks at the Toronto end before even getting on the plane, and then at Miami simply walked off the plane, picked up luggage and were gone. A little strange how that worked, but I liked it.

The best option over to South Beach was a taxi, which didn't take too long. We got dropped off at the location I gave but it just looked like a restaurant. It seems they've gone and put a restaurant into the bottom of the hotel building, almost at the expense of the hotel check-in, it's just tucked away in one corner. I'm not sure if it's just this hotel or a common thing at the beach, but there's a mandatory-room-surcharge of $20 to cover beach towels, optional early check-in, bottled water each day, wireless internet and a couple of other things. To me it's just ridiculous you're allowed to do that, to make the room seem cheaper is the only reason I can see for it.

Up in the room this wireless internet I'm paying extra for was dropping out - that's Boston, Toronto and Miami all with crappy internet that keeps falling over. Also the mini-fridge had a lock on it?? so I went back to the reception later and asked about it. The guy told me it's a mini-bar not a fridge (it's still a fridge idiot) but he didn't have any keys left. Great.

Walked over to Washington Street and then up to Lincoln Mall. About every second store on Lincoln Street is a restaurant / cafe for about 8 blocks in a row - and they actually fill up at night. Came back down Ocean Grove and since it was evening all the restaurants along here were doing their dinner service too. Almost as bad as Las Vegas, maybe worse, every restaurant has someone out the front trying to hand you a menu and tell you about their specials. It's just too much. Thankfully you can just cross over, which is better anyway because it's the park/beach side and you can also see all the art deco style hotels too. Sadly I had not watched Jersey Shore (in Miami) before going on holiday, so I did not know all the good clubs to go to.

Washington Street.

Lincoln Mall.

Ocean Drive.

Ocean Beach.

Lincoln Mall at night.