First Week in North Miami Beach
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Our first week here was spent getting to know the area, shopping for food, finding a YMCA, shopping for clothes and exploring the beach and other activities. Our rental is not much to look at from the outside. The inside is neat, clean and relatively roomy for a one-bedroom mobile home. It has a great entertainment center with a 50-inch screen. I brought our Roku stick from home so we can enjoy all the programs we normally watch. The wifi signal is fast and strong There is no landscaping around our unit and not much throughout the neighborhood. However, the price point was within our budget. We are only 15 minutes from an extensive public beach and from Aventura Mall, the biggest mall either of us has ever seen. Also, we are five minutes from a Costco.
We found the closest YMCA in Hallandale Beach about 15 minutes away. It is brand new and very
user-friendly. We had some trouble getting access as Y members since we didn't show up as national members. A friendly staff member helped us set that up and so we were able to use it for a week. Eventually, we got confirmation from our Y back home that Silver & Fit members are not considered part of the national membership program. So after a week, we have taken to walking for our daily exercise. But before that happened we needed to go out and buy some appropriate workout clothes. I realized that was necessary when I saw Marilyn trying on some tops at Costco. I put my foot down and took her immediately to the nearest Lululemon store.
We spent Sunday afternoon exploring Oleta River State Park. At just over 1000 acres, Oleta is the largest urban park in Florida. The Oleta River (Big Snake Creek until 1922) connects the Everglades with Biscayne Bay. When we visited it was filled with large family groups picnicking, cyclists on the more than 15 miles of trails, paddle boarders, people fishing, and just walking. We drove through the adjacent Florida International University-Biscayne Bay campus. You click here to view some photos of Oleta River State Park.
Our first beach day was at Haulover Beach. This is a 99-acre urban park located on a shoal between the Atlantic Ocean and Biscayne Bay. It is noted or notorious for the northernmost half mile which is an officially designated nude, clothing-optional, naturalistic (take your pick.) There is even a gay section specially designated, whether officially so or not I don't know. We stayed well to the south and enjoyed a couple of hours of the late afternoon sun. Marilyn spent her time collecting shells while I looked for possible photos.
As soon as we arrived, I notice several of these guys littering the beach. Even if we had been intending to get in the water, the presence of Portuguese Men of War would have been more than enough to abandon those plans. These unique creatures are not really an animal at all but a community of four separate animals acting in concert. "Despite its appearance, the Portuguese man o' war is not a true jellyfish but a siphonophore, which is not an individual multicellular organism (true jellyfishes are single organisms), but a colonial organism made up of many specialized animals of the same species, called zooids or polyps. These polyps are attached to one another and physiologically integrated, to the extent that they cannot survive independently, creating a symbiotic relationship, requiring each polyp to work together and function like an individual animal." (Wikipedia) See more here.
After a couple of hours of sun, we moved to the intercoastal waterway side of Haulover Park. Before 1925 there was no water access from the intercoastal to the Atlantic Ocean at this point. Fishermen had to haul their boats over the narrow strip of land to the ocean and hence the name. In 1925 a man-made channel was cut to make the hauling unnecessary. The name remained. We decided to come to the park on this day because of the weekly Food Truck Event. We were not disappointed. This family-friendly event was relaxed and wonderful. There were no alcoholic beverages. Kids playgrounds were set up. The music was from the seventies and eighties.
The food was delicious. I selected some mahi-mahi fish tacos from
Rico Fish and Marilyn had a lobster roll from Red Zeppelin. We both shared an order of tequenos from the Venezuelan food truck. This was in honor of Salvator Perez of the Royals although Marilyn was unaware of that. We finished off with a gourmet milkshake from the Market Milkshake Bar truck. Yummy. Yummy.
As we shared the peanut butter milkshake, we thought of Tom and Monica McFadden and gave them a call. Then we enjoyed the sunset as the magical light illuminated the park. Click here to view more photos of our day at Haulover Beach.
The final noteworthy event of our first week was an afternoon on the boardwalk at Hollywood Beach. Unlike the beaches at Haulover, Hollywood tends to be filled with tourists. We didn't do any beaching but we took plenty of time to watch the people. My brother-in-law, Peter Doyle, has made a specialty of street photography on their many world adventures. I decided this would be a good time for me to try my hand at it. Here are two of my favorites.
You can view them all by clicking here and going to the Google Photos album.
Our first week here was spent getting to know the area, shopping for food, finding a YMCA, shopping for clothes and exploring the beach and other activities. Our rental is not much to look at from the outside. The inside is neat, clean and relatively roomy for a one-bedroom mobile home. It has a great entertainment center with a 50-inch screen. I brought our Roku stick from home so we can enjoy all the programs we normally watch. The wifi signal is fast and strong There is no landscaping around our unit and not much throughout the neighborhood. However, the price point was within our budget. We are only 15 minutes from an extensive public beach and from Aventura Mall, the biggest mall either of us has ever seen. Also, we are five minutes from a Costco.We found the closest YMCA in Hallandale Beach about 15 minutes away. It is brand new and very
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| A single, dazzling bloom |
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| Pasty white northerner seen here looking to the south. |
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| Shell gatherer obvious to surrounding seagulls |
After a couple of hours of sun, we moved to the intercoastal waterway side of Haulover Park. Before 1925 there was no water access from the intercoastal to the Atlantic Ocean at this point. Fishermen had to haul their boats over the narrow strip of land to the ocean and hence the name. In 1925 a man-made channel was cut to make the hauling unnecessary. The name remained. We decided to come to the park on this day because of the weekly Food Truck Event. We were not disappointed. This family-friendly event was relaxed and wonderful. There were no alcoholic beverages. Kids playgrounds were set up. The music was from the seventies and eighties.
The food was delicious. I selected some mahi-mahi fish tacos from
Rico Fish and Marilyn had a lobster roll from Red Zeppelin. We both shared an order of tequenos from the Venezuelan food truck. This was in honor of Salvator Perez of the Royals although Marilyn was unaware of that. We finished off with a gourmet milkshake from the Market Milkshake Bar truck. Yummy. Yummy.As we shared the peanut butter milkshake, we thought of Tom and Monica McFadden and gave them a call. Then we enjoyed the sunset as the magical light illuminated the park. Click here to view more photos of our day at Haulover Beach.
The final noteworthy event of our first week was an afternoon on the boardwalk at Hollywood Beach. Unlike the beaches at Haulover, Hollywood tends to be filled with tourists. We didn't do any beaching but we took plenty of time to watch the people. My brother-in-law, Peter Doyle, has made a specialty of street photography on their many world adventures. I decided this would be a good time for me to try my hand at it. Here are two of my favorites.
Or you can see them all in the four-minute video below.
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