Three Adventures on Our Florida Trip

During our Florida trip we had three memorable adventures... in chronological order.

1) We only packed enough clothes for 5 days on our 10 day trip. We planned a laundry run in the middle... after the hotel, and before the cruise. About 9:00pm Sunday night we left our "4 Star" hotel (at a 2 star price :-)) to find a laundrymat. After driving around for 1/2 an hour and utilizing all of our GPS resources we found an outdoor/open air laundrymat. If you have ever been to Miami you understand how quickly the neighborhoods change. I would never put the family at risk and was convinced the patrons at the laundrymat were "good people" who didn't have a washer/dryer. It took a while to convince MacMom but I think she would agree it was "ok"... we did have the kids locked in the car for the first 30 minute cycle.


2) The kid's club counselor that Alex had made friends with recommended Mr. Sonchu's Beach in Cozumel. We disembarked (got off the ship) in Cozumel and made our way through the strategically located shops to the taxi stand. Once in the taxi I used my 4 years of high school Spanish to request that the driver take us to "Mr. Sanchu's Beach". We were off. After about 100 yards he told me we should go to the "Carlos and Charley's Beach". He could seel me discount tickets... not sure we were comminicating as it was already 1pm nd we just wanted to go to a beach... not have an "all-you-can eat and drink" experience... we were already on a cruise... the cab was quiet as I explained all we wanted to do was go to Sanchu's beach... eventually he got the picture and I stood my ground... we made it to the beach and to our surprise, it was the exact same beach we went to the last time we were in Cozumel.

3) It is very expensive to fly out of Toronto. Buffalo is about the same distance from our house and usually about 1/2 the price. Buffalo is in a different country so there are risks with the line-ups at the border crossing. Everyone tells us it is risky to fly out of Buffalo during the winter because of the snow. We usually fly out of Cleveland and are lucky to have Nana and Papa watch Coco while we are on vacation. It works out well for us and Coco likes her mini-vacation too. Our flight on Saturday from Tampa to Cleveland was delayed 3 hours because of the snow in Cleveland and surrounding areas. When we arrived in Cleveland we were lucky to get a hot meal from Nana, pick up Coco and hit the road for Oakville. The roads were bad... we saw a "spin-out" off the highway every 30 miles. Our normal 5 hour trip took 8 hours.