I realize (too late maybe) that I didn’t finish blogging
about my Florida and Bahamas trip…
There was a lot of good and a bit of loneliness. I
encountered some weirdness, a bit of inconvenience and a whole lot of fun.
I seemed to have left off in North Miami Beach… I jaunted
from there to the Keys driving in my rental car to BigPine Key where I had rented an RV in someone’s backyard as my airbnb mainstay. Big Pine Key is close enough
to Key West and I drove down there for a day and eve.
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| Hawaii, Kauai ©KAH |
The Keys – I wanted to like them. I wanted to love them but
I didn’t. I won’t go into all the reasons why except to say that growing up in LosAngeles has obviously spoiled me. I have also spent a lot of time in Hawaii
and well TheKeys are not either… Key West is relatively tiny and overpriced, crawling
with tourists and snowbirds
(the people who spend their winters there but really live in cold locations). I
met some really nice locals though. Two of the women I met even came up to Big
Pine key and visited me, we went out for dinner. The beaches were just ‘eh, in
my opinion. Not a lot of sand and windy.
It could be the time of year, it could be the beaches I ended up visiting. All
I can say is that my fantasy was completely different from what I found.
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| Key West ©KAH |
OldKey West town is really cute though and since I love architecture I was
happy to walk around for hours and hours.
All in all - I do feel that staying at an inexpensive place
40 minutes north of Key West was the way to go. And… driving up and down the
Keys was fun and very pretty. Maybe if I’d had more time to explore…
I drove back to Fort Lauderdale which I ended up loving. I
only stayed for a night, also with a wonderful girl I found on airbnb who let me leave my rental car parked
on her street for three days. I took an uber
to the airport and flew to the GrandBahamas Island. Originally I’d planned to take the ferry but I waited too
long and the ferry was sold out on the way there so I booked a flight on Bahamas Air and it was actually cheaper than
the ferry
and a thousand times better! I took the ferry back and do not recommend it. The
ferry takes 4 hours and you have to arrive 2 hours early plus when we went to
disembark they kept us standing and waiting (without a reason) for another
hour. If I were to go the Bahamas again I would never take the ferry. Ferry = 7
hours. Airplane = 1 hour.
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| Taino Beach, Grand Bahamas ©KAH |
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| Grand Bahamas ©KAH |
The Bahamas = well, well, well… A hidden treasure to be
sure. Another successful airbnbbooking with James who runs a really cool place that you can even book longterm. The room I was in had it’s own kitchen and dining room and 2 separate
bedrooms. Each room may be a little different but I think they all have
kitchens. Plus it’s a 10 minute walk to Taino Beach that may as well be private
because for 2 days I was the only person on it!
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| Tony Macaroni's ©KAH |
There’s a larger hotel that uses part of the beach but I
only saw people there on 1 of the 3 days. There’s also a reallycool conch shack that has amazingly delicious food and is run by a very
eccentric character named TonyMacaroni (not his real name)…
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| Me in the Bahamas ©KAH |
My time in the Bahamas was the best
part of my trip, hands down. It was exactly what I was looking for, gorgeous
sand beaches, warm water and no people! Of course the Bahamas Tourist Bureau is trying to change
this! The downsides were: the price of food and the lack of anything organic or
without added sugar! I couldn’t even find a coconut but James cut one down from
a tree for me!!!
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| The Coconut! ©KAH |
I did the math and could afford to stay for a month IF I
find someone who will go with me and split the place of a rental. You can eat
for less if you make your own food of course but even then, it’s not the food
I’m used to. It’s packaged with preservatives and all that crap we try to
avoid.
As for traveling solo to the Bahamas – well, there was a
tiny bit of a downside. Sure I got tons of male attention but that’s not really
what I’m after when I’m traveling by myself. I’d rather make genuine
connections with people (like the women I met in Key West and the women I
stayed with in Big Pine Key and Fort Lauderdale). I did feel an authentic connectionwith James, my Bahamas airbnb host. Both James and is daughter Jamie wereexceptionally nice to me. But… it’s more of a place for romance and lovers.
Sure there were other single women there and I could definitely see doing a
writer’s retreat or something like that but for three days it was hard to
connect with anyone. I did, however, feel very safe and in the end that really
is the most important thing.
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| Fort Lauderdale Beach ©KAH |
After the Bahamas I returned to Fort Lauderdale where I
spent a day on the beaches
there. They were not nearly as nice as the beaches in the Bahamas (ie: tons of people, high rises in the background and dangerous to swim) but they were
still pretty great. And the breakfast place
I found on yelp was yummy, even if it wasn’t healthy.
I’m told they do have farmersmarkets in Fort Lauderdale and other organic options. All in all I could
see myself living there, out of every place I visited on that trip.
Safety – there was not one place or one moment during my two
weeks in Florida and the Bahamas that I did not feel 100% safe.
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