The flight was fairly uneventful, although a bit of frequent flyer residual status ensured that I got a crew rest seat on the plane, which is basically a big cushy fully reclining seat in a private area of the plane, much to the frustration of most of the other passengers. Arrived in Miami and met up with Morten who promptly took me to a local pub for a couple of hours, in sight of the runway so we could see when Steve’s plane landed in, then we went and met him too!
The first night we spent on Morten’s deck drinking copious amounts of wine with his girlfriend Johanna, next day wandered up and down Miami Beach and went out in the evening with Javier, another old Kenan cronie. Next day we headed off to Key West and landed ourselves a great little motel pretty much in the middle of downtown, Steve organised a fishing trip for the following day and myself a two-tank dive onto a wreck. The wind has been up the last few days so the seas were rough, but visibility was still pretty decent underwater and had a good couple of dives, coming across a monster size ray and moray eel just sitting there minding their own businesses. Steve’s boat also had a pretty decent catch, Steve catching some kind of sail fish which is apparently a once in a lifetime event, but declined to fork out the $1000 dollars or so required to have it stuffed and put in a show case…
Hit the town that night, there’s some great bars all around the marina area which we duly crawled around, me lasting only until 2am or so but Steve making it to the full 4am mark. Apart from the wind the weather was nice enough, mostly sunny and about the 87 region, and the humidity wasn’t as bad as it could have been, maybe due to the wind or something.
Now we are back in Miami at Morten’s place again, about to cook some of Steve’s “catch of the day” on the barbie. Tomorrow we’ll take his boat out weather permitting, then the drag starts of packing up our stuff. Incidentally, I’m returning the phone I borrowed and don’t think mine will work in South America, so I maybe out of phone contact for the next 6 weeks or so.
Oh, and if anyone is flying from Miami to the UK in the next 4 months and has space for a 60 lb duffel bag in their luggage, please let me know 🙂