Art Deco in South Beach

Traffic in Miami is the perfect storm of awful. While our drive up from the Keys this morning was faster than it had been on the way down last Saturday, we still hit stop and stop traffic once we got to Key Largo (no Obama this time - no idea what the problem was). Making our way to the Ritz Carleton Biscayne Bay where we are enjoying the lap of luxury before heading home tomorrow night, was also relatively easy. So, in the spirit of die-hard tourists, we decided to cross the last thing off the list and head into South Beach to the famed Art Deco district in Miami.

Traffic. Stop and Stop. at 3pm. Was nothing compared to the stop and really stop traffic we experienced trying to get back to Key Biscayne at 5:30. It took an hour to go 6 blocks. Not exaggerating. It was mind-blowingly bad traffic. Again, no idea why other than lots of people not moving. Green lights and no one moves. Glad that's done.

So now that I've shared the worst of today, let's dwell on the best of today. After last night's rain and thunderstorms, today was windy but sunny. We were able to drive with the top down again. The Ritz Carleton is obscene. Clearly designed for fancier folks than us, but we're doing our best to play the part. Lunch today was at the beach side Mexican restaurant. To go with our requisite lunchtime beers (that will be hard to give up when we get home), we ordered fish tacos. Sounds pedestrian - was quite the opposite. We were each served a grilled half snapper, complete with taco fixings like jicama and pickled onion, salsa and mango puree. It was amazing. For dinner tonight, we settled in to a leather couch in the Rum Bar off the lobby where they serve many types of mojitos. While the Black and Blue which contains muddles blackberries and blueberries along with the usual mojito stuff, was good, the runaway winner was the coconut mojito. We know what I'm having tomorrow by the pool. We had sandwiches, which were pleasant enough, but, another runaway winner - their version of sticky toffee pudding, was out of this world. Homemade butterscotch sauce. There aren't words to describe!

So, South Beach. I didn't watch Miami Vice. Can't even name the main characters. I don't watch CSI Miami, but now I will just to see if I recognize anywhere. I will need to rewatch Robin Williams' The BirdCage because I think the club was on Ocean Blvd. It reminded me a lot of Nice, with the beach on one side of the street and the sidewalks on the other side taken over by bars and restaurants. Nice also has a number of Art Deco buildings. The ones here have been nicely done up (restored). We wandered into a few lobbies of the hotels on Collins Avenue, and they have done a wonderful job of restoring the time period. I was really hoping to see Esther Williams' pool at the Raleigh, but a commercial was being filmed, so no entry and so much for that. The National Hotel even had its lobby furniture copied and rebuilt to replicate the time period. 

I'm glad I had the chance to see Miami and Key West. We have had a wonderful holiday. The one challenge with going away is that there is so much tv to watch when I get home. Now, in addition to CSI Miami, I need to watch a really bad Bond movie that was set in Key West (even had a fight scene on 7 mile bridge!) As my gran used to say, it's nice to get away, but nothing tastes as good as bread and butter at the kitchen table when you get home. Here's to bread and butter.