Bienvenido a Miami!

We arrived in Miami to some awesome weather and we did look a little silly stepping off the greyhound bus dressed in all our layers! We had to take two more local buses to get to South Beach where we were staying. We saw downtown Miami and famous areas such as Little Haiti which did look a little sketchy to say the least!

We did well securing our hostel over the Christmas period, it had a full size outside swimming pool and a nice little outside kitchen. It was a good spot to chill and enjoy the great weather. We were just off Lincoln Road which is a pedestrianised street full of shops, boutiques, restaurants and bars which was a lively area that had a good vibe.

We visited a photography studio showcasing the work of Peter Lik. His photography was awesome and if you are a fan of natural landscape photography check out his website http://www.peterlik.com/photography. Lincoln Road was close to Espanola Way which was a great little latino street that also had some cool art galleries.

Christmas day was very different to anything we had experienced before, no Christmas roast or freezing cold temperatures but instead we had Mcdonald's on South Beach in Miami, oh yeah!

All the bars, restaurants and shops stayed open which we were surprised about. In the evening we went to the cinema to watch Sherlock Holmes but we hadn't anticipated how busy it was going to be and unfortunately it had sold out. Instead we went back to the beach and had a few drinks. It was a great evening.

The following day we took a visit to the Art Deco district. The area represents Miami's classic architecture with buildings dating back to the early 1900s. It is a pretty impressive place, awesome colourful buildings with palm fringed streets looking out to the ocean... not bad!!

We took a little walk down the famous 'Ocean Drive' to see some of the sights. Ocean Drive has been shot in a number of films and for all the film buffs out there the buildings in the two photos below were used in Scarface (the brutal chainsaw scene), Bad Boys 2 and a number of other films....

There were many well known buildings within the Art Deco District including Al Capone's office and Versace's house below where he was shot dead on his doorstep...

I went to see an eye specialist in Miami as I was having a few problems with my right eye. He was great and has suggested I try some new lenses which would be better suited to my eyes. I am just speaking with my specialist in the UK but it looks like we may be returning to Miami after Mexico to get fitted with these new lenses.

We would have liked to visit the Everglades but unfortunately our budget dictates that we cannot do everything. We'll save that for next time!

A bird also crapped on my head. Apparently this is supposed to be lucky. I'm not quite sure how but I will accept this. Big things for me in 2010!

Miami was a great place, we chilled on the beach in the day and by the pool at night, it was a good place to recuperate! I think however, we were both expecting something a little different, probably due to TV and films. One thing that did stick out was the amount of homeless women, we have seen quite a bit of homelessness on our travels but the majority have been men. I was also not aware of how large a majority of Miami were Spanish speaking, more Spanish appeared to be spoken than English. This was all good as it was preparing us for our next stop... Costa Rica!!

Bienvenido a Miami!

Miami, United States