Wednesday, July 06, 2005

Miami & Orlando, Party time!!!


Back again with travelogue of my trip to Florida...It was bright sunny day, myself and my roomie started from office at 4PM thinking we can catch the 6.45 PM flight to Miami with no issues...but it so happened that we got stuck in a traffic jam and we reached the airport with 45 mins to spare for the flight to depart from Chicago...we were joined by Kiran at the airport...once we went throught the security check we came to know that our flight was delayed by an hour. We had some chit chat and then reached Miami at about half past nine...Once we reached Miami we had a tough time to find the platform where the car from the hotel had come to pick us up. We came to know that spanish more widely spoken in Miami than english...once we reached the hotel we went to sleep hoping to have a fun filled long weekend...Pretty early in the morning we woke up and got ready and had french toast for our breakfast and waited for our other two friends to join us from Ft.Meyers. After about an hour long wait our friends we started towards Miami airport to rent car. From there we went to South beach to have a taste of Florida. Later we went to a restaurant called Mangoes which gave us the feel of Florida with all the slasa tune and dances that were happening around us...after spending about just more than 3 hours there enjoying salsa... we crossed the road and we landed at the famous South Beach of Florida...We wet our feet at the beach and chatted for some time and then thinking how we will go about our remaning plan...later we decided that we will drive to Ft. Meyers overnight and take rest for some time at Suresh's house and then again start for Orlando at about 3.30AM. We kept as per our plan and started to Orlando at 3.30AM and with a small break at a gas station for a munch and coffee at 7.20AM on the way we reached SeaWorld at about quarter past eight. At the gates of Sea world there was a long queue waiting for the gate to open, meanwhile I thought I will take break from sitting in the car, so I got down from the car and heard a hissing sound...to all our surprise our car's front wheel has been pierced by something sharp and the air was going out from the tyre. Immediately Suresh and myself tried our hand to change the stepny wheel but our hard luck the car jack was not working. Meanwhile Neeru called the road side support of our car rental but we were turned down by the poor customer support, luckily a Sea World person saw us and offered us help to change to our backup wheel...Once we entered Sea world we split into two groups and went around Sea world all day. We had a perfect day close with the independence day special fire works display by Sea World. Once the fireworks came to an end we checked into a hotel. After a good sleep we got ready for Universal studios. The whole day we spent in Universal Studios going around the different rides that was present. At about 5:30 PM EST we bid bye to N and S who were going back to Ft. Meyers. K, A and myself went to Kiran's to one of his cousins house, who lives in the University of Central Florida campus.
The next day we were planning to go to the Kenedy Space Center but later due to the time constraint we dropped that plan and went for a nice lunch to an Indian restaurant and later we went to a place called Gator Land.
This is one old place filled with Aligators and Crocodiles. We had a nice time watching various shows. They made the aligators jump from water and get a chicken that was hanging in air. By the time we finished going around Gator Land it was time for our flight. We had a rush a bit back to home take our stuffs and leave for the airport. Once we reached the airport we came to know that the flight was delayed by 2 hours. So we relaxed for 2 hours in Orlando airport and later boarded the flight to Chicago and reached Chicago at around 12 midnight...Back home after an exciting long weekend.