Day 6 South from Vero Beach

It was the best of times and it was the worst of times. Don't remember what novel that comes from, but it truly describes our day yesterday. We got up, got moving, and stopped by a very nice coin car wash to get the crud off Mr. Vette. The car wash was one of the nicest I've been to, and had this new do dad that has a nozzle and lets you blow-dry your car. It's sort of like a captive leaf blower with a hose and hand nozzle. Using that after the spot free rinse gave an excellent result. We pulled out to a nice finish up area, and did a little detailing. We then went next door and paid the highest for gas so far on the trip. Chevron premium for $2.68. After fuel, we hooked up with our friends Neil and Andrea to visit for a while. They live in a very nice gated community in the Southern part of Vero Beach. After a nice but too brief visit with them, we headed South again on A1A. It was a 100% perfect day, with the roof down, sun shining, and about 76 degrees. As has been the norm, A1A is difficult to follow, but with Vickie on the Delorme, we persevered and kept with it. As we proceeded South, we passed through different named areas, but eventually came to West Palm and Palm Beach. WOW, this is where some of the old money must be in Florida. As we traveled A1A going South toward Ft. Lauderdale, we passed ocean front castle like houses, with landscaping that must receive daily attention. Most had walls and/or 10-ft high perfectly manicured hedges, with ornate iron gates. It impossible to describe how beautiful all of the landscaping was. The sub tropical climate here allows them to grow exotic plants, and what we consider annuals grow in unbelievable colorful abundance. Another thing I noticed was of the oncoming traffic, every third car was a Porsche, Bentley, Jaguar, Aston Martin, and occasionally a Ferrari. This is where they must sell all those exotic cars. Up until this point, we had a perfect day, but things started going a little sour. We thought we might land for the night in Pompano Beach, but we were unable to score a decently priced place. So Wes said, Ft. Lauderdale is where all the kids go for Spring Break so there must be hundreds of rooms. So we drove on South. Somehow, we never seemed to find where the hundreds of hotel rooms were in Ft. Lauderdale, and the traffic got really abominable. So Wes said, let head back toward Rt. 1 or I-95, there ought to be lots of rooms there. What we didn't know was that snowstorms up north had snarled air traffic, and everything we tried was booked solid. We found a Holiday Inn that still had 2 rooms left for only $309.95 each plus tax. The clerk cheerfully told us it was "just supply and demand" but I call it extortion. We tried a Marriott we found in downtown Miami, and it was in the $260.00 range, so Wes said, I'm heading South on I-95 until we get out of town. Don't know if anyone has ever driven I-95 from Hollywood FL South through Miami, but best I can tell you is DON'T. It is 8 lanes of dodgem car insanity. And then to really fool you, you are rolling along on I-95 and there is a sign that says Junction RT 1 and it literally does that. One moment you are barreling along I-95 with 5000 other idiots, the next you are on Rt. 1 and stopping for traffic lights. I've never seen such a mess in my life (except maybe Northern VA or Cranberry Township in PA). Well we kept on driving, finding nothing, (it's now about 9:00 p.m. with no supper) until we spotted a Best Western. About 3 turnarounds and a couple of U-turns later, I came the wrong way into the driveway. We got a room for a reasonable price and crashed. Turns out in addition to everything else 10 gazillion people were also in town for the Food Network's big deal in South Beach. (found out via the paper this morning) Today we are going to continue to head South, we'll just have to come back and see South Beach and Miami Beach another time. Since we got a little ahead of schedule due to last night's marathon drive, we called the resort in Key Largo, and they agreed to extend our stay for another day at the same rate. So, we aregoing to head for Key Largo today and check in there tonight. Looking forward to some laid back R&R. More later.

Wes and Vickie