I LOVE KEY WEST Part 1

It's the title, it's the topic.
I've only been to Key West for a few days (eh... two), but I liked what I saw. The atmosphere, the look and the people - I really did like it all.
So I'm going to show you a lot of pictures, that's why I'm splitting this entry into two.

But first a little history class:
Key West has actually nothing to do with "West" - it's the southernmost point of the US. Key West is more of a translation mistake. The first English speaking settlers misunderstood the original name Cayo Hueso (means island of bones, long bloody story) and renamed it to Key West. Great huh? Okay, now that you've learned something, we can start with the pics.

This tour was one of the longest (I guess it actually was THE longest) journey during our trip. Driving from Miami to Key West takes some time, but it's very interesting, because the most time, all you see are bridges.
It basically looks like this:

You have tiny tiny islands, that can hold nothin but a road. The height difference between ocean and land is not even 30cm and yes, left side of the lane is water again. Sometime for miles. It can be a little frightning.

So we drove and drove and yeah, nothing interesting happened. Or I don't have it on picture, because we had our film camera with us. We only had a stop here:

And lunch at IHOP. I love diners! It's really sad, we don't have places like IHOP or Denny's in Germany. It's really nice there.

Our food (of course):

So yeah, I had a burger... But if I remember right, it was the only one during my 2 weeks there! I didn't eat the mayonnaise and it was good! What kind of buns are these? Never seen them before.
Maybe you wonder ( I guess you didn't even realize, but I'm telling you anyway), why my parents had breakfast for lunch. In my family we love warm breakfast (basically because we never have time to make one). We love it so much, we could eat it all the time. I love having bacon and eggs for dinner.

A couple of hours later we arrived at Key West (sadly our hotel was quite outside). I have pics of our room, but they look the same like the ones in Cocoa Beach. They look all the same...

This day was almost over, so we decided to just drive to the city and take the ghost tour. Again, I have lots of pics. But it was dark! I can't show you, I'm sorry.
It was a really interesting tour, where a guide takes you through town to all the creepy places, where people died or murdered or I don't know forgot to turn off the oven. Stuff like this. He (his name was Mike) did a good job, it was very funny. Or maybe it was supposed to be scary and he did a miserable job. I don't know, I felt entertained!

That day, we also took the chance to see the boardwalk. It's totally famous, because every evening the people gather to celebrate the sunset. There are lots of artists and strange curiosities and when the last sun beam vanishes, everybody claps. It's great.

On this pic, it's a little too early, there aren't a lot of people there yet. But there will be when it's getting darker.

They also have guys like this! I never thought, they really existed.

It was so cool!


The next entry will be about our second day, Ernest Hemingway, more food and everything else.

Welcome to Miami

2nd part of my Florida vacation diary. Maybe I should have actually written one, because I'm having some hard times to remember...


Miami was our first "real" hotel - It had 10 floors with lots of rooms and a crazy expensive parking spot. All the other place we stayed were more like motels ... so several houses with 3 floors max and a space to park for everyone ... and everyone else. But hey, I liked it everywhere!


SO.
First day.
OH MY GOD, what did I do?
I don't remember.



Oh right! I was at the beach! South Beach. I only got to bath in the sea twice. That was really odd, because I'm used to getting into the ocean every day at least once when I'm on vacation.

I can't say I'm sad about it, because the water is so warm, it's not refreshing or anything.

Because we didn't have much time that day, we decided to just go out for dinner, sleep and have very exciting day the next morning. Yes. We WENT for dinner. My dad had the awesome idea to WALK 35 blocks.
The concierge also told us, it wouldn't take longer than 20 minutes.
He lied.

So we walked.
Had Sushi.

Came back and I was in pain. Me feet, my back, my head ... everything just hurt. And then he started to explain to me, I have to work out if that little walk was exhausting for me. In that moment I hated him really bad. -_-

But oh well, the next day came and we had to do something. So we decided to go see Villa Vizcaya!
It's an awesome (like really AWESOME) Italian Renaissance like estate close to Miami, that was build by James Deering (millionaire thanks to harves machines) in the 1910s (of course) and got a musuem during the 50s.

It's really big and beautful with lots of gardens and woods surrounding it. (btw, that's me under the star fishs, but I looks sorta ugly here...)
It also has lots of fountains like this one:

And check out the pool!

 I would totally live in a place like that, wouldn't you?? Well of course it's way to expensive for me (like multimillions to expensive) but maybe one day ...)

I'm sorry, it's not allowed to take pictures inside, so I tried to find some on google, but they're a little small. Here you go.

After that, we went for lunch at a mall and I found the Christmas in Miami store. I'll make an extra post for this later.

The least expensive (What's wrong in this city?? Everything costs way to much!) was pizza:

How can I say this? I think American pizza is good ... but it's like they try to drown it in oil and if it's not dead then, bury it in cheese.

We then decided to do something for my dad (altough he made me walk my feet off, I'm just too nice) and used the metro mover.

It's small train, that goes in circles (similar to Ringbahn in Berlin) but the drive doesn't take 20 minutes. It's ridiculous! BUT it's for free, so what the heck.
You can see an interesting side of downtown Miami. Btw, did you know Miami and Miami Beach are actually two different cities? I didn't know.

That nigh, we decided to go out for dinner. Again. And go to the Art Deco district. Again. But at least we took the car this time!
The art deco distric is a really cute and colorful district with lots of bars and restaurant. It's just not my cup of tea and I don't know why! I usually like everything between 1880s ~ 1950s ...

We had Mexican food. I LOVE Mexican food, but somehow I don't know anyone else, who likes it.

I had this:

It's like a steak tortilla and it was SO GOOD.  I don't know what they did with the onions (little cup at the left) but they were the best I've ever had.

My mum let my chose for her (she doesn't like Mexian food very much) and I picked chicken enchilada in a green sauce (don't remember what it was):

It was all very interesting, but still Miami wasn't the most interesting city during that trip.

Kennedy Space Center

Our first stop during our Florida trip was Cocoa Beach, which isn't THAT big of a deal and not very popular I guess (well, they do have the biggest surf shop of the world, that's pretty cool)...

But very close is Kennedy Space Center ...

I can't say, I was very interested at first, because I'm not a big astronautics fan...
But it was pretty amazing!

We started right off with a simulator, where you can "feel" a rocket launch. It's a nice idea and it's a little like you're experiencing the real thing. Of course they make a lot out of imagination.

This isn't the simulator, it's just a model nearby ... You could walk inside an check what it looks like...

There were a lot of videos and shows and stuff, that was designed justify the billions, that the US put into astronautics ... Well, I expected explanations blaming the Russians and everything, so this wasn't a big surprise ... it's getting a little boring...

They also have some 3D movies, that we had to choose from ... You can watch Transformers 3D, but it would have taken like FOREVER ... so we went for Hubble 3D and it was a great decision ... narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio it told the story of the Hubble Space Telescope, that shows the universum billions of lightyears away, cradle of stars and explained why we need it ... it was so beautiful and you should watch it, when you have the possibilty.

They currently have a Star Trek exhibition ... I'm not a fan, so not a big deal for me, but it was cute how they rebuild the controle room.

What was quite amazing was this thing:

It's the landing capsule! From a rocket, that's all what's left when the austronauts come back to earth. Three guys of girls have to fit in this ... can't imagine that!

Of course we had food as well! I'm one of the persons, who always make pictures of food ... For over 3 years now, I want to remember what I ate ... well ...

Those fries were like ... so ... good? I guess ... Well they were good, but so salty!! I'm sure it's all to get the people by drinks. Unfortunately, the cheese nachos weren't good at all ... oh, the nachos were, but the cheese! Wait, no ... not cheese - putty! Urgh.
 Infront of us were a bunch of Japanese people (I don't know, but I always meet Japanese) and the girls took like THE WHOLE MENUE!! It was really impressive ... they had Turkey legs (WHY ON EARTH can you buy turkey legs everywhere??) and one is enough for two ... but know, they also took hot dogs, nachos and Italian sausage and ... pretty much everything else.

So, that was it about Kennedy Space Center.
Here are the other interesting pictures from Cocoa Beach:

Ron Jon Surf Shop ... Biggest Surf Shop in the world ... they say.

M&Ms Coconut ... Maybe that's nothing special, but we don't have them in Germany and I've never seen them before so I had to take a picture.

My hotel room. Nothing special I guess ... Every room looked like this ... don't know why you need two king size beds everywhere.

Our car! So big ... and now about food.

Our breakfast. None of the hotels had breakfast, soooo ... we bought  bread (tipp against boredom ... try to find good, crispy wholegrain bread America), jam and some cheese and orange juice.

Dinner time! We went to Denny's and I've been there before in Japan but the menue here was (of course) different.

Well, I had the chicken, so I guess I was good. Haaa, it was really good! I don't know how they make the corn, but it's good.

Well, I think that's enough for now!! More about my trip later. :)

Souvenirs from Florida

So, everybody I finally managed to break free some time to blog ... of course I'm lying, I still have plenty of time and I'm just like really lazy.




I want to blog about all the "stations" I've passed during my Florida vacation, because it was short (two weeks only), but intense! One of the best vacations of my life!
I think I really like the USA ... I didn't think I would, but it's nice there.






To begin with, I'll show you, what I brought home. Souvenirs are always a very important part of trip to me. It helps me remember all the sweet memories, I had in a different country or with my friends and family. Only problem is ... every year I end up buying way too much!

Well, here is, what I got from my Florida trip:

Plenty, huh? It's not even all!! It's only the stuff I could find the easiest...

Spiralwise from left to right ... only Disney stuff here: Retro Minnie T-Shirt, Mickey egg shaper, Minnie and Donald ball pens, "Four Parks One World" CD, Stitch Dangler (can't believe, some people thought I'd come back without a Stitch...), Hello Kitty Dangler (but bought in Disney World), Marie notebook, Minnie keyring.

Clockwise from left to right: Key Lime cake (A very important cake in Florida ... had some there and I don't like it at all. But hey, I don't have to eat this one.), "I Need My Space" bag from Kennedy Space Center, "Failure Is Not An Option" ball pen from Kennedy Space Center, NYC Sparkle Eye Dust, earrings from MIA, false lashes glue from Ardell.

The top from left to right: Harry Potter Chocolate Frog (they actually have cards, I had Rowena Ravenclaw), Butterbeer mug, "Hot Dance of the Roaring 20s" CD (got this from the Edison house) and a brown belt.

I've made tons of pics I'm going to show your over the next few days. It really was a great trip...

Great Week!

This week ... is so ... AWESOME!!!

I don't know why, but this week there were so many great things happening to me. I'm so happy.

First, I was in in Disney World, which is enough happiness for a whole month.

When I came home, I got to know that I can go to Humboldt University ... I already took this spot, it was my dream.

Then, they told me, my grandma's fine ... she was really sick, when I left, but she's good know. Thank God.

Today I got a mail, I got first place in Closet Voyage giveaway. I can't remember, I ever won something, so this is great. Thank you!! I only got to know about this giveaway thanks to my friend Laureen, so I think I'll share a bit. :)

My boss from subarashi also had some great news, that I can't talk about yet.

So yes ... yesterday I came back from my vacation and I'll be posting about it soon. It was really great.

Sign of Life

Hey everybody, thanks to the free Holiday Inn Wi-Fi, I can write this entry. Half of my Florida travel is already over, time is passing so fast! When I realized, I had only a week left, I was quite shocked since I feel I haven't seen enough or didn't spent enough time. I only have two nights for every city, it's not enough. I guess a three weeks trip would have been better, but who could afford it? Not me.

First, we arrived at Orlando but we weren't going to stay there. Orlando is the big finale of this trip.

So we got our car (strangely we could pick whatever car we wanted) and drove to Cocoa Beach, which is really small but it was cute. Our stay there wasn't about Cocoa or Beaches, it was all about Kennedy Space Center, which is (believe it or not) very interesting!

Don't wonder about the dots! My mom is hidden underneath. :)
You can learn all about space travel and astronauts. They also have an Imax theater (watched Hubble 3D, which was AMAZING!) and a simulator, where you can feel a shuttle start. It was great, but I think my faced formed into something new...

So, the next day, we finally got to MIAMI! Hate me ... I didn't like it very much. Maybe because I had no chance to party or meet Will Smith and stuff...

But there were a few cool things. They have this great Art Deco district in Miami Beach and a great Renaissance like villa nearby. I'll tell you about it later.

So, in Miami I went to indulge my passion. The guide book told a lot about eating fresh fish and mentioned two sushi bars, so I stopped by.

Well, what can I say. It was good, but I had better. Especially since they tried to poison me by serving shrimp shumai instead of pork, that I ordered.

They also had this cute shop:

Guys, it's Christmas decoration. It was called "Christmas in Miami" and they offer tons of this stuff. Can you believe it?

So yesterday I left Key West, which was AWESOME! I'll about it later... just check this pic and you know, I loved it.

I don't know if I'll be able to post again during this trip. Tomorrow I'll see the Everglades, then 3 other cities and thel ast 4 days Orlando. It's so stressing.

See you!