"2004 Spring in Miami" Top 5 Page for this destination Miami Travelogue by grandmaR

RosalieAnn in Miamarina

We wake at 6:30 and the boat hasn't moved an inch. There are two other boats (one a trawler and one a sailboat) also anchored here. Bob thinks they came in after us. The wind is really blowing hard, and Bob feels that it would be too difficult to pull the anchor against the wind. So I call our SIL and tell him that we won't be in to see them before they go off on Spring Break.

Bob apparently sees that I am really unhappy with staying at anchor for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday (which is the amount of time this rough northeast wind is supposed to be here), so he asks me to ask the marina if we can have a slip on the south side of the dock facing north so that the wind will be blowing us out of the slip instead of into the slip. They say that we can do that.

So I start trying to motor up to the anchor - taking the strain off the anchor rode so Bob can crank it up. Then we motor towards Miamarina. When I call them on the radio, they try to put us on C dock (south facing) and I have to insist on the north facing slip.

They assign us to B26. Bob overshoots a bit because the slip is on the other side of a big power boat, but he gets the boat turned in the channel. The bow is blown over toward the power boat, and I try to toss the line for the port side to the dock man who is slightly on the starboard of the bow. I miss the toss and get the line caught up in the anchor. Bob gets the bow in to the finger pier and the guy picks the line up off the anchor.

The guy in the Gozzard on the other side of the power boat was amazed that Bob could apparently just stop the boat in the middle of the channel like that (he couldn't see that he was trying to maneuver back to the slip that he'd overshot) and was convinced that we must have bow thrusters.

After we tied up, Bob walked up to get the car (which I hadn't canceled yet), and we drove out to our daughter's. Bob and our daughter and our granddaughter went to our grandson's ball game (he had an awesome game), while our SIL worked on the new family room and I logged on with the computer. Our SIL and I met the ball playing group at Red Lobster for dinner.

Bob sweeping up drywall dust

After Bob did some shopping (he wanted to replace the spare filters that he used at Indian Key ) we had lunch at Dennys we went to our daughters - she got me an appointment to get my hair cut. She took me and dropped me after she took our grandson to pitching practice, which I watched some of first.

Bob meanwhile was taking all the construction debris (our SIL and daughter knocked out the wall between the family room and our grandson's room) and loaded the skip with it. After we got back, I cut Bob's hair and then we left and had dinner at Lombardis (one of the restaurants at Bayside) when we got back.

March 25 - We babysat while our daughter shopped for their camping trip tomorrow. We had dinner at Bayside again - this time at the new Chili's that is there.

Fairchild - Entrance to vine covered walk

Our daughter's family left in the morning for their camping trip. Bob's foot hurts - he's done something to it. He's taken some Aleve.

We went to Fairchild Gardens in Coral Gables and had lunch there and then took the tram tour. Then we went to our daughter's house and collected the mail and fed the animals and did some email. We had dinner at Dennys on the way back to the marina.

Caoe Florida Light

We crossed the toll road at Rickenbacker Causeway to Virginia Key, and drove the length of Key Biscayne to Bill Baggs Park.

We had to pass the site of the NASDAQ tennis tournament which had somewhat of a traffic jam. We ate lunch at No Name Harbor at the Boater's Grill. We then went out to take the 1300 lighthouse tour. Bob didn't want to stress his foot, but I actually climbed to the top of the lighthouse. Then we went out to our daughter's house to check on things and Bob picked the tomatoes and grapefruit, and left there and had dinner on the way home at Bennigans.

1967 Room inside the entrance

We went to Vizcaya in the morning. They don't allow photography in the building, but I took some pictures out of the windows and into the windows. I have additional photos - some taken in 1967 when photography was not prohibited under Bricknell Hammock

We ate there, and went to our daughter's house. Bob did some laundry, and then went to the store for the perishables. He is convinced that our daughter's neighbor is not installing their floor right.

Vizcaya in '67 looking down into central courtyard

Went to our daughter's to finish up email. I am having a lot of trouble with pocketmail. It has strange filters and I can't clear out the email that is spam. Anyway, I called them for the umpteenth time, and I can't use it until they correct the problems with it. So I'm switching the way I'm doing it so that mindspring isn't forwarding all my mail, but instead pocketmail is picking it up - hopefully after it has most of the spam filtered out. If that doesn't work, I'm going to have to change my email address.

After our daughter's family got back from camping, we all (including our SIL's half brother) over to their friends for dinner. Our daughter supplied the hamburger. Then we went back to the boat.

Vizcaya butler pantry

Bob returned the rental car and walked back to the marina, and I paid the bill and took a shower. I called Harbortown in Ft. Pierce for a slip. We cast off about 9:30. This is the first time since December 2000 that I've been into or out of Government Cut (Miami's harbor entrance) during the day.

We passed south of Dodge Island, and north of Fisher Island and we went through Government Cut and turned north along the Miami Beach area.

Next: Offshore to Ft. Pierce.