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This is part 2 of 3 cities we stayed at during this vacation:
Day 3: Tues., Feb. 10 - We packed up from our 2-night stay in St. Augustine, FL. Grabbed some coffee in the lobby before checking out. Drove the 2 hours South back to Orlando to return our rental car. We caught a cab to the Amtrak Train Station about 8 miles away.
Waited an hour for our train, ate a quick hotdog, then boarded the Amtrak @ 2pm and took the 5 hour train trip down to Ft. Lauderdale. We watched the towns go by, played iPad games, read, napped and ate our snacks. Our old high-school pal (Jim Hopkins) who moved to Ft. Lauderdale last month picked us up at the train station and took us to the FOX car rental place (5 miles away).
We rented a blue Yaris hatchback. We then followed Jim 1 mile up the road to a local fave restaurant named Ernies BBQ where we treated him to dinner. We were starving and it was GOOD. Gave our hugs goodbye about 9pm and drove 40 minutes South to Surfside, FL. We stopped by Publix (grocery store) first for our 5-days worth of food supplies and drinks) before checking into stop 2.
We arrived at Surfside Solara, FL, at 10pm. Here is the link:
http://www.bluegreenvacations.com/resorts/fl/solara-surfside
We got a newly renovated room. Pretty small and no tropical colors like last time we were here. A little disappointing but the location makes up for it (right on the beach)! Plus a 95 degree outdoor pool tempurature. Hot tub is even hotter. Weather has been 73ish this whole vacation. YAY
Day 4: Wed., Feb. 11 - Made a big breakfast, downstairs to the workout room for an hour of exercising, then off to the beach for tanning. Later we hit the pool and hot tub. Our most RELAXING day of this whole vacation. Ate fresh baked cookies compiments of our resort. Later we dressed up and strolled a mile down the beachwalk to a fancy Italian place named Pescecane. Bottle of wine, pasta & veal. YUMMY This was our 9th Valentine dinner celebration.
Day 5: Thurs., Feb. 12 - Got up early and made breakfast. Then downstairs to lobby for our bus/boat tour @ 9:30am pickup. We toured downtown Miami & Coral Gables, plus surrounding cities. 2 hours for the city tour, then 1-1/2 hours for the boat tour. We saw fancy houses, Little Havana, Belmont Hotel, Coconut Grove, American Airlines Arena (Miami Heat), Freedom Tower, Coral Gables, fancy ocean front homes and yachts.
We ate ice cream at Azucar (in Little Havana) and Chuck bought some cigars at Little Havana Cigar Shop. We spotted the Carnival Cruise ship that our friend Laura O'Steen was on (getting ready to depart). We had a tropical drink in the harbor while waiting for the Island Queen to take us for our boat tour.
Tour bus took us back to Surfside about 4:30pm and we made leftovers, sat out on the patio so Chuck could smoke his cigar. Cheryl did some laundry, then both downstairs for some swimming/hot tubbing. Nice hot shower and goodnight!
Day 6: Friday, Feb. 13 - Slept in til 9am. Ate boiled eggs & muffins, then cleaned up and put all our suitcases in our car for the morning. We checked out and hopped a city bus for the International Boat Show in Miami. We walked around with the rich folks and boarded several million $$ yachts. They are unbelievable! Stayed about 2 hours, then hopped the bus back to our resort, picked up our car and off we went to Marathon, FL (in the Keys).
Please read: Stop 3 - Marathon (Key West) for the rest of our adventure.
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