During Spring Break Oli and I made an one-week round-trip in Florida:
Fort Lauderdale - Miami - Florida Keys and Key West - Everglades - Miami Beach - Orlando - Cape Canaveral
Florida, the "Sunshine State", is one of the most important focuses of U.S. and international tourism. Long, white beaches and natural swamp areas, colorful coral reefs, huge entertainment parks, and the space center at Cape Canaveral make a Florida vacation a tremendous experience.
Fort Lauderdale |
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Fort Lauderdale, often dubbed the "Venice of America", with its total of 260 km artificial waterways lined with beautiful palms, its ten thousands of resident yacht bases, countless water sports, and with its 10 kilometers long dreamy beach attracts every year tourists from all over the world.
What to see?
Despite these sights, Fort Lauderdale is rather a city where one can relax on the beach and does simply nothing.
Miami and Miami Beach |
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Long a popular setting for TV shows and movies (just remember "Miami Vice"!), Miami's Latin heart pulse to the beat of the largest Cuban population outside of Cuba. Many small communities distinguish Miami's residential areas: from little Havana, a well established Cuban Community, to Coconut Grove, an eclectic intellectual enclave turned stylized tourist Mecca. Nearly 8 million tourists populate the city every year - to experience this "Hollywood of the East Coast" in all of its star-studded, bikinied gusto.
What to see in Miami?
What to see in Miami Beach?
The Art Deco District dominates Miami Beach. It teems with hundreds of hotels and apartments whose sun-faded pastel facades conform to 1920s ideals of tropical paradise.
I had the feeling that in Miami Beach everything revolved around a certain idea - to see and to be seen. However, the atmosphere there was absolutely great!
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The City of Miami
The City of Miami Beach
Florida Keys and Key West |
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The Keys (from the Spanish word cayo - reef, cliff) stretch some 320 sun drenched kilometers from Biscayne Bay to the Dry Tortugas, encompassing innumerable islands, reefs, lakes, bays, and beaches. From the largest island, Key Largo, to the tip of Key West, they are linked by 43 bridges scattered along the 200 km Overseas Highway. As traveling along, one will come to appreciate the green and white mile marker telling how far one has come, and how much farther one has to go.
Key West
It has known the best of times. It was America's richest city per capita in 1889. It has also known the worst of times. It declared bankruptcy in the 1930s. Through it all, Key West has retained its status as one of the world's most intriguing cities.
Key West's tantalizing temperatures once inspired such acclaimed writers as Ernest Hemingway, Tennessee Williams, Elizabeth Bishop, and Robert Frost.
What to see?
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Everglades |
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Encompassing the entire tip of Florida and spearing into Florida Bay, Everglades National Park, the third largest national park after Yellowstone and Death Valley, spans 1.6 million acres of one of the world's most beautiful and fragile ecosystems. A host of species found nowhere else in the world inhabits the saw grass, mangrove swamps, and coral reefs: American alligators, dolphins, sea turtles, and various birds and fishes, as well as the endangered Florida panther, Florida manatee, and American crocodile.
What to do?
The park is positively swamped in fishing, hiking, canoeing, biking, and wilderness observation opportunities. But forget swimming! Hungry alligators, sharks, and barracuda patrol the waters.
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Everglades, Florida
Everglades National Park
Orlando |
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Orlando, that's the center of the most visited regions in the world, around 10 million tourists flood the city every year. Disney World, Sea World, and Universal Studios are instrumental to this run.
Oli and I visited Orlando Downtown and Universal Studios.
Orlando Downtown
Beautiful Church Street and Church Street Station are a must-see in Downtown Orlando
Universal Studios
Opened in 1990, Universal Studios is both amusement park and working film studios. Rides take on movie themes - for example, E.T. Adventure, Back to the Future - The Ride, Terminator 2: 3D, Twister, Jaws, ...
Since the park also makes films, celebrity sightings are common. One may recognize a number of Universal's back-lot locations at the park - Hollywood, Central Park, Beverly Hills, the infamous Bates Motel from Psycho, and the street front from the Cosby Show.
New since 1999 is Citywalk, a 30 acres of shops, restaurants, clubs like Motown Cafe, and live music galore.
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Cape Canaveral |
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All of NASA's shuttle flights take off from the Kennedy Space Center. The Kennedy Space Center Visitors Complex provides a huge welcoming center for visitors and 3 bus tours:
What else to see?
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Urbana-Champaign | Chicago | Amish Country | St. Louis
Florida | Buffalo | Albany | Boston | Cape Cod
New York City | Philadelphia | Baltimore | Washington
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