Well, today was another long one. Not a lazy first day of January 2024. The festivities of the New Year's fireworks definitely stole a good night's sleep from us last evening. The fireworks in all parts of the town began shortly after sunset, increased as you might expect, closer to midnight, then continued for an hour. One most disturbing thing occurred around 10:30pm, when it sounded like a car blew up in front of this hotel. One other guest made a comment to us about it this morning as we all waited for the elusive elevator. Did we mention there was a problem with one of the elevators? It had broken down a few days ago, and it had not been repaired. We were allowed to use the service elevator which was located near the lobby. If repairs are not completed before January 3rd, there may be a problem checking out of this hotel. For those who may have mobility problems and difficulty getting luggage down from the upper floors, hotel help would be provided. Hope the elevator is repaired…..
So off we went to Joe's Café, a short walk to the Harbor Shops up the road a piece. This small cozy café is opened early, but closed at 3pm, much like Country Waffles is where we live. It's one of those rare places where everyone knows everyone. And the food, coffee and service are excellent. The hotel does have a breakfast buffet, but we are not fond of them, even on the ship. And besides, the walk did us good. As the day developed, we ended up getting more than we expected with the walking. By the way, this mini mall has Publix, Total Wine, TJMAXX, Ace Hardware, banks, and Duffy's Bar & Grill. We have a little shopping to do, but we decided to save it for Tuesday.
Before noontime after catching up on news and weather on TV, we headed out again and walked over the 17th Street Bridge, where we watched the bridge open up for vessel traffic below. Always fun to witness. Maybe not for the cars that have to stop for 5 to 10 minutes. Our destination was the Ft. Lauderdale Beach and the Las Olas area. The weather here was next to perfect with blue skies, few clouds, and temps in the low 70's. No rain, humidity, or wind. For us it was perfect walking weather. Taking our time, we made it to the strip of hotels and restaurants that face the white sandy beach dotted with many palm trees.
One of us did make a mistake, and forgot to bring a bottle of water. It doesn't have to be hot to get dehydrated. So there were several small shops that sold water and sodas along the way. We made it almost to Sunrise Blvd, then decided to turn back and find a place for lunch. By 1pm, this whole area became quite busy with late-risers who were crowding every food eatery. We kept to the original plan, and went back to Bubba Gumps for sodas and beer with a shared appetizer of fried chicken and pickle slices. The pickle slices were a real treat. Relaxing for an hour was even better.
We guess that about every single person that passed us along the way, said Happy New Year. They are most friendly here, even the kids. Crossing the E. Shaw Jr. Bridge again, we stayed and watched two sessions with the raising and lowering of the highway. We never saw so many pleasure boats out and about today, but then it was a holiday.
Finally, one of us got some photos and spent some time sizing and sorting in the room before heading out to dinner. The sun had set with a beautiful orange display on the western horizon. Pictures would not have been good, since the windows in our room were rather soiled. Certainly, we will capture many more sunsets in the days to come.
By 6pm, we headed off for a light dinner, but this time went to Carrabba's Italian Grill & Bar. Our first time there, we had checked out their website, and decided they had fresh pizza as well as a variety of Italian dishes. Salad and pizza sounded good. But it was not exactly to be. The place was about full of seated guests, and even more folks lined up for "take-away". We were seated within ten minutes, placed our order, and got some sliced bread with a tapenade with mixed olive oil. Caesar salads (dinner size) were brought within minutes and they were ice cold and delicious. For our main entrée, we decided to share meatballs and spaghetti, which we thought would be following the salads. Well, they had not anticipated the amount of take-away orders, so the folks in the restaurant were put on hold while bag after bag of container food was taken out the door. It was almost an hour waiting, when we told the waitress, we could not wait much longer. One of us was falling asleep. By magic, the heaping bowl of spaghetti with three meatballs arrived to the table. We were glad we had waited because it was excellent and more than enough for both of us. And besides that, our waitress had brought three rounds of sliced bread while we waited. Totally full, we left the restaurant by 8pm, and headed right back to our nearby hotel. Expect to sleep well tonight.
Tomorrow will be an evening hosted by our travel agency with the CEO and his wife, three top agents (including ours), and 4 hosts. Should be fun.
Bill & Mary Ann
