Day 4, June 1, 2006: Vero Beach to Miami/Key Largo and back to Vero Beach

(Day 3, or start from Day 1)

Day 4, June 1, 2006 -

During this trip, it is quite understood that we do not want to spend money on hotels. We want to be with the people that we encounter every day. So when we woke up today and tried to plan out the day's activities we came to a "blank" when we thought about where we were going to sleep tonight.

We got up around 9 a.m. and had breakfast with Rivers and his wife, Katy, and said our goodbyes then took off for Key West. The drive was gorgeous and we had the windows down for most of the day.

As we passed through Miami, we decided to stop and look around considering neither of us had ever been to Miami. We saw a sign for South Beach and decided that since we had heard of the South Beach Diet that it had to be a place to see. While in the city streets we saw a sign for "A-1-A Beachfront Avenue" and instantly started singing Vanilla Ice's "Ice Ice Baby."

We got out of the van at South Beach and I was surprised at how few people were there. We jumped into Pacific again and swam in much warmer waters than we were used to. After drying off, I made some comparison comments of Lake Hefner and South Beach and we hopped in the van heading south.

Going over the bridge we noticed a large arena and then saw a sign about the Miami Heat and we got excited. Last year Miami got Shaq and now the Heat are pretty dominate. Last night they lost in the conference finals to defending champs Detroit; Series is tied at 2-3 and they play in Miami tomorrow.

Going through Miami, we reach the beginning of the Keys and quickly figure how long it is going to take to get all the way down to Key West with such a slower speed limit so we decide that Key Largo is a good place to stop.

We stopped to fill up the tank and ask some of the locals about what there is to do and they suggested snorkeling and told us where to go...sounded good to us. So, we went snorkeling. While snorkeling I came across a 5' barracuda that I swear growled at me. Pretty scary. We also saw some lobsters, stingrays and some tropical fish...this trip is already incredible and it's just Day 4!

After snorkeling we went to a local eatery named "Hobo's" and got some seafood and ordered a couple of beers from Key West. We both ordered a Mahi-Mahi sandwich...Yum! We watched the first part of the Yankees game and when we left they were up 5-0 but I saw that they lost 7-6 to the Tigers.

Well, as it was almost dark and we were exhausted, we called up Rivers and asked if we could drive back up to Vero Beach and stay with him again...he said yes. So, goodnight from Vero Beach.

(Day 5)