OUR FIRST FULL DAY IN MIAMI - DAY 2

A Look At What Is Happening Today:

Enjoyed Our First Full Day In Miami ✔  Took A Couple Of Long Walks ✔ Enjoyed Terrific Weather ✔  Purchased Some  Items For The Cruise  ✔Dinner  ✔ 

We really have come to love Miami and this is yet another example of why one needs to be flexible in all that they do.  

Our view of Miami used to not be so good given the couple of times we visited the city in the 1980's and 1990's.  Our preference at that time was Fort Lauderdale.  We may have avoided Miami for many years to come with that image still in our minds.  However, this all changed when we sailed out of Miami as part of the 2007 World Cruise and had the opportunity to spend a few nights in this city and we could see all of the positive changes that took place in many parts of the city from the downtown area to both Miami and South Beach. 

This city has become very cosmopolitan and each time we return we see additional improvements.  Including this visit, we have returned here four additional times since 2007 and we love it more each time.

From December until around the end of May brings a lot of tourists to the city and this time of the year is one of the busier times.  Many tourists from Europe, South American and Mexico enjoy celebrating the holidays in Miami which adds to the diversity of this city.

We spoke with friend Ricki last evening and look forward to sailing with Ricki and David on the January 4 Caribbean Cruise.  We fell asleep easily since we had a very long day yesterday.  The hotel is pretty much full but we could not hear a peep from any of our neighbors.

There are still items from Christmas around the hotel.  These are photos of Christmas Trees from the lower level entrance into the Hotel from the street, and from the main lobby area.

Not your typical Gingerbread house because we are in South Florida. After the devastation from Hurricane Andrew in 1992, artists began to incorporate designs into many of South Beach's lifeguard towers.  This gingerbread-lifeguard tower is a replica of the 3rd street tower.

For those of you who have been following our travels you might remember that normally we purchase some basic breakfast items and have them in our room (cereal, fruit, etc.).  This time around breakfast is included in the hotel package and we had a choice of dining at the restaurant or ordering room service and we decided to go with room service.  We had a simple and healthy breakfast.

While Anne Marie got ready Keith stopped by the Fitness Center.  The Fitness Center is for all hotel guests as well as for those who have residences at the Four Seasons Hotel and also has memberships for others.  It is extremely large and features a wide range of equipment.  For those of you who are in Keith's spin (indoor cycling) class in keeping with the before Spin weight lifting he did his 20+ minutes of weightlifting.  He is committed to keeping up with the weightlifting throughout our travels.

Afterwards, we took the first of several walks and this one was over to a drug store and also to a grocery store to pick up some of the items on our shopping list for the voyage.  These are mainly liquid items that we could not ship, are not allowed to be checked on the plane, or could leak so we will carry them onto the ship ourselves.  Speaking of these types of items we mentioned that one of the suitcases we take is essentially filled up with cosmetic/toiletry items and even in past years when we take many suitcases with us on the plane, there was a note in this one from the TSA noting they inspected the bag.  This makes sense given the amount and type of items that are in this suitcase.  We do lock our bags with the TSA locks so they can easily open the lock without the need to cut it off.  

After having lunch, we took a very long walk.  We walked from our hotel over to the Port Of Miami.  It is about a five mile walk to get over to the port.  

There were six ships in port all lined up.  This included three Carnival ships, one Costa and one NCL ship and the Disney Wonder.  It was difficult to get them all in one photo but hopefully you can see them all.

As we walked back we stopped off at the Intercontinental Hotel and right next to it was a ship called Seafair.  It has not windows and is primarily used to showcase art but tomorrow evening they will have a New Years Celebration on-board the ship.  Later this month it will leave Miami and make stops at several different Florida ports where art shows will be held.

We then walked around other areas of the downtown area.  This is one of the iconic buildings of Miami.  For a special exhibit they are featuring you can see the Gecko's on the facade of the building.

After walking about 11 miles we had dinner.Once again, we dined again at Perricone's and plan to dine there just one more time during our pre-cruise stay.  We have reservations at three other restaurants including New Years Eve tomorrow evening.

We sat in another area of the restaurant this evening.  This is one of the areas that is outside.

We each had a dinner salad.  Anne Marie had the same salad as last evening and Keith had the organic dinner salad which is shown below.

For our entrees Anne Marie had the Yellowfin Ahi Tuna Steak 

Keith enjoyed another entree special.  This time he had Norwegian Salmon crusted with Wasabi.

We thoroughly enjoyed our entire meal including the delicious entrees.

As we were leaving the restaurant we took a photo of one of the entrances to the restaurant.

On our way back to the hotel we made an additional stop to pick up a few other items that we will need for the cruise.  We just have a couple of more items to pick up over the next day or two.

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TODAY'S THOUGHT FOR THE DAY........

“If I knew I was going to live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself.”  - Mickey Mantle

Keith and Anne Marie