An extremely early start today, whose idea was it to book an international flight for 6:45 am? We had booked a taxi for 4am and for once we were collected on time, but at the airport we found that the staff hadn't started work, though at least this time we could sit inside the airport while we waited for the check-in counters to open.
It was interesting to see how different cultures greet each other, whenever someone new entered the airport and sat down they greeted everyone already there with "Good Morning", that sort of thing also happened all through South and Central America, quite different to back home.
The counters opened up around 4:45am and luckily we were very close to the head of the queue, because from there it all started falling apart! Stupid us had been travelling so long without doing much advance planning that we had completely neglected the fact that we needed to arrange a visa to enter the US. We were informed that we could do it online and it shouldn't take too long, and least the airport had decent free wifi, so after spending quite some time submitting data into web pages we returned to the check-in desk.
By the time we were seen again M's visa had come through but K's hadn't appeared in the system, so we were stalled at that point. The girl at the counter was very patient and helpful and periodically looked for K's visa while she continued to check in other passengers. We were seriously considering whether M should go ahead on his own when just a few minutes before check in closed K's visa came through - crisis averted! The check-in girl said she had been so worried for us so you can imagine how stressed we were, we may not have done our research very well but luckily we always make a point of getting to the airports early!
At Miami airport we picked up a rental car at the largest car hire terminal we have ever seen, they say everything's bigger in the US, there must have been over a hundred people collecting cars.
Our first stop was Coopertown to take an airboat ride on the Everglades, the boat glides smoothly over the grass and water with barely any movement, a lot of fun. We managed to see a few alligators, one incredibly close, right next to the side of the boat - they wouldn't let you get that close to a croc in Australia. Further on we saw more than twenty baby alligators, less than two weeks old, guarded by their much larger mum.
We then drove south from there to the Florida Keys, stopping for lunch at a Waffle House at Key Largo, where we had some very yummy hash browns - there's something they should have back home!
We arrived into Key West at the southernmost point of the US late that afternoon, after driving for hours over the bridges between the islands that form the Florida Keys. We found a cute fish and chip bar for dinner, we had been hanging out for some normal fish and chips - no potato cakes, dimmies or chiko rolls unfortunately. It's quite a culture shock to have left 7 months of pretty basic "service" to the over the top American style of service, always checking we are happy or need anything else. You could also say we are easing into it gently as Spanish is widely spoken in Miami and South Florida, people working in shops and restaurants appear to be fluent in both English and Spanish, though Key West seems to be a very "white" place.
After walking around the harbour we wandered along Duval St, where there was a mass of people, and we could observe people getting tattooed through the street windows. It was also unusual to see people walking down the street with their drinks in their hands, this was a very happening place, and as it was Saturday night the place had a very festive atmosphere.
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