Universal Studios

One of the strangest things that has happened on this trip is listening to radio on the way in to and out off Cape Canaveral. There is quite a sizeable town down the road called Melbourne. It even has its own international airport. Anyway many of the ads are for businesses located in Melbourne. It has been doing my head in listening to them talk about Melbourne and the ridiculous things they advertise here (think ambulance chasing lawyers and pointless medication and medical procedures). 

Where I have been staying is a holding hotel for people heading out on cruise ships, mainly to the Caribbean. These people park their cars for the week and stay at the hotel for a day either side of their cruise. It is so intense. I went for breakfast on the first morning (many of you may be aware I am not really a morning person) and it was like America was learning to play rugby in the breakfast room. Once I understood what was happening I realised I needed to prepare myself to play full contact breakfast, whoever pushes the most people out of the way and gets the most food wins. I had to channel my inner boarding school student and take myself back 30 years to have a suitable mindset to participate. The second morning I was ready and by 8.30am I finished breakfast, jumped in the car for my visit to Universal Studios.

Now I am not much of a theme park goer but I am a nerd and Universal in Orlando has the only Harry Potter themed place in the world. With my inner geek channelled I sallied forth to participate. At this point I need to offer up apologies to Graceland and The Kennedy Space Centre. They were mere amateurs when it come to ensuring that you hemorrhage money. Parking $17, one day ticket to both theme parks (you see they have Hogwarts in one and Hogsmeade in the other and you ride the Hogwarts Express between the two) $156, crappy meals and drinks $40, obligatory souvenir t-shirt $25. That's a total of $238. Add another 40% for the exchange rate and without setting foot outside of Universal I have propped up the local economy by $320. Lucky it was good.

It has been years since I have been to a theme park and I have never visited one solo before. At first is was a little weird but then I realised how much blood I had spilled and just went for it. I rode the Jurassic Park ride, the Men in Black ride, the Revenge of the Mummy ride, the 2D & 3D Adventures Across Time Terminator Ride, the Twister ride, the Simpson's ride, the Spiderman ride, the E.T. ride, the Flight of the Hippogriff ride, the Escape from Gringotts Bank ride, the Hogwarts Express and the 3D Transformers ride. I also watched the Blues Brothers Show and the Street Parade. So if I happen to come across a questionable copy of a movie made by Universal ever in my life I will console myself by knowing that I gave until it hurt. 

Cape Canaveral

It was another of those days where I was walking amongst living history. The Kennedy Space Centre is vast, I mean its really really big. I took a bus ride from the visitors centre that lasted for 50 minutes it took us out past launch control, the vehicle assembly building (VAB) and the famous Apollo and Space Shuttle launch pads themselves. We didn't dawdle but that's seriously how long it took. I think it is something like 13 miles from the VAB to the launch pad. Did I mention it's humongous?

Now where we are in Florida is near Port Canaveral which is a commercial port and cruise ship dock, there is not much else around. I fear that Graceland and Kennedy Space Centre have been to the same money extraction school. Again $10 to park. I don't mind paying really I don't but we are miles from anywhere and in the middle of this vast empty space, it's extortion. 

To make up for it however the toys are really cool. They have a real Saturn Rocket, a real Space Shuttle and a very cool shuttle simulator. It was a different experience to Houston but still seeing how it all fitted together was fascinating.

Those are some real wheels off the space shuttle, the rear ones were only used once and front ones twice. That is the real launch control as it was for Apollo 8. That is the real re-entry vehicle as recovered from the Apollo 14 mission. Of course the top is the real Space Shuttle Atlantis.

I learnt some interesting things here. The massive plumes of sparks you see for about ten seconds before launch are deliberate and are there to burn off any extra fuel that may escape during take off so you don't get a massive fire. The huge clouds of what I thought was smoke during launch is actually steam. They drop 1.1 mega litres of water on the launch pad as a sound suppression tool and it gets vaporised during takeoff. There were another cool thing I got to do today. I walked out on the gantry used by the Apollo 11 astronauts on the moon mission.

Also I got to see a Manatee (basically they are a sea cow) in the wild today at Cape Canaveral. Sadly I couldn't get the camera out in time. There are only 5,000 Florida Manatees and sightings are not common. As soon as it saw us it dove down and muddied the water then crawled/swam away in the murkiness. This is what one looks like.

So back to the space stuff. We took at a look at the transporter which took the shuttles from the VAB to the launch pad. Top speed unloaded 2 miles and hour. Top speed loaded just under one mile an hour. The entire unit weighs in at about 2,700,000 kilograms and has eight tracks, two on each corner each with 57 shoes that weigh just short of 2,000 kilograms each themselves.

The other really amazing thing is the Vehicle Assembly building itself. It sits pretty much alone so its hard to get an idea of the scale of the thing but it is where they put together the final bits of the Apollo missions and Space Shuttle missions in an upright position. The pictures below have an American flag on them. The stars on the flag are two metres across. You could park a bus on a stripe and not touch it's edge. It is so large it has to have special ventilation to prevent clouds forming and even rain from falling. 

Anyway that's it from the Geek Wonderlost roadtrip for the day. I am hoping to do Harry Potter World tomorrow but it will depend on a few things coming together. Fingers crossed.

The Everglades

Before leaving South Beach the Miami weather had to turn on one last storm to make sure that driving in city traffic in a shit box Chevy on the wrong side of the road didn't get too easy. Actually I can't complain the airboat thing was about 40 kilometres out of town and depending on traffic conditions the GPS said it would be between 37 minutes and 1 hour and 9 minutes. I allowed 90 minutes and even in traffic and a pretty decent storm did it in under 30. So I'm sitting here at a truck stop waiting to meet my guide. 

All the hotels on South Beach like to rape you when it comes price. The holy grail of a city hotel here is one that comes with parking, breakfast and wifi, even two out of three would be good. You can always stay out of the city centre but you still have to find and pay for parking (around $15 to $35 depending on where you are and how long you stay). So while my Miami Beach hotel was a pretty good deal it didn't come with parking or breakfast. Breakfast was not that big of an issue as I just had it wherever I was heading and if I timed it right you could always skip lunch. Its quite cheap to eat here but not if you want to eat something a little healthy. This breakfast I decided to live the American dream and eat at an old fashioned diner. How good does this look?

Breakfast was great and while I was hoping the waitress would be some broad named Doris who was world weary and seen it all before I had to make to do with a smoking hot Cuban fox whose mere presence was enough to arouse me from my drunken stupour.

I hit the road and made the truck stop where we were scheduled to meet our guide to the Everglades. To fill in time I was sitting typing furiously on my tablet when two ladies came up and asked me if I was Carl. It was too early in the morning for me to do cheap lines like "I'll be whoever you want me to be" so we got chatting and discovered it would just be the three of us airboating (if that's even a word?) the Everglades. Can I say right now that riding an airboat is one of the coolest things I have ever done in my life. Its so much fun. It felt like a guilty pleasure. I kept looking around waiting for someone to yell ".....what the hell do you think you're doing? Get off that thing" then take away my new toy. God how I enjoyed it.

We were out on The Everglades for over an hour and a half. But who gives a shit about that right. This thing can do 50 miles an hour, we got it up to 47. It has no reverse gear and no brakes. The way you stop this puppy (and for that matter steer the thing) is by way of power slide and the application and reduction of power. For about the first 15 minutes it was raining and the very real fear was we may have to head in. A lightning strike on three million acres of water only six inches deep when you're sitting in a metal boat is not something you want to be a part of. Apparently the electricity from a lightning strike takes 30 miles to dissipate here. Fortunately it soon cleared and we didn't get to test this hypothesis. Steve the driver cranked it up and we had the time of our lives.

Plus we got to see alligators, two alpha males, a few females and whole swath of youngsters. They swam right up to the boat. The biggest one was about three metres long so nothing like our monster crocodiles but still impressive to see in the wild. We entered Indian land which was also a little special. There had recently been an accident where two airboats collided. I only saw two other boats the entire time we were out there and one of them was in dock. How two could collide in so much space I do not know. Anyway It was seriously cool. So below are the obligatory wildlife photos to pretend that was what I was there for. But just between you and me it was to fulfil a childhood fantasy to ride an airboat. Job Done!

Anyway I am at Cape Canaveral for the evening. I didn't even realise it was Friday night so I am sitting at a Grills Seafood Deck & Tiki Bar eating steak and enjoying the band. Tomorrow I head to The Kennedy Space Centre. I am pretty sure now that I have been to both Houston and now Cape Canaveral that I now qualify to become an astronaut. I will send you guys a postcard from Mars.

Miami

The weather here has been quite ordinary so I while haven't been entirely confined to quarters it has not been lets hit the beach then sip mojitos by the pool. I finally got out to do some stuff today and had a bit of fun. Miami has a real edge to it and I am sure if you weren't careful then you might actually get yourself in quite a bit of trouble. There is a sign I see all over the place that is a good indication of this. If you're building has a balcony, deck or any area that is easy to access from the street you will be displaying it prominently.

The vagrants here are legion and seem to be totally ignored by the general populace.They range from old derelict hobos to bible quoting firebrands to out and out crazies who threaten to kill you. You can't complain about the variety. There was plenty of vagrancy in Sydney when I lived there so it is not unknown to me but this is on an entirely other level. I used the public bathrooms during the middle of the day on South Beach and I literally had to step over homeless guys to do so. I have never pissed so quickly in my entire life.

Anyway so now for the fun stuff. I went and checked out downtown Miami, it is a different city to Miami Beach where I am staying and it felt like I was in an episode of Dexter or Burn Notice, everything was so familiar. It has amazing skyline and it has hard not to be impressed. 

I also headed to Little Havana to check out the Cuban part of town. It is lower middle class and would not be a place to venture out to a night on your own I would dare say. It is littered with giant chickens (I nearly ran a live one over in Key West, they love the damn things) apparently they bring you good luck.

I relented and purchased some cigars from a cigar factory and will bring them home and compare them to the Cubans I have left.

From Little Havana I headed to the Coral Gables, yet another city that makes up part of greater Miami. It has buildings constructed from coral and is essentially where Miami as we know it was founded. It has some pretty impressive architecture and a world famous hotel called The Biltmore. You could pick up a home around here for about $4,000,000 US.

After checking out these places I hit the water and did a tour past what they call Millionaires Row. I should have snapped off a few shots but I mean I wouldn't want to live there. The homes were beautiful but the lack of privacy was astounding. During daylight hours they average one tour boat going past their front door every 20 minutes. You would have to love the limelight. They are located on private man made islands and are worth millions. The most expensive one sits on six acres (a massive plot in an area of already vast opulence). I didn't find out the value of the place but apparently the annual tax assessment on it is over one million dollars. It was owned by the guy who invented Viagra who is worth about $5,000,000,000.00. I guess his palm trees wont blow over in a hurricane (boom tish).

It is a veritable who's who of the entertainment world. The likes of Jackie Chan, Sylvester Stallone, Gloria Estefan, The Beckhams, Mike Tyson, Antonia Banderas, Rhianna, Shakira and so many more I have forgotten already have places here. 

Just by way of an amusing anecdote I walked passed a modelling agency, strangely they didn't clap their eyes upon me and ask me start that very moment, but I was quietly amused by the sign at the entrance. 

Tomorrow I am off to The Everglades, hopefully the weather will hold out. I am booked to do something I have wanted to do since I first saw one as a kid and that's ride an airboat. It looks like it will be an absolute blast.

Miami Nights

Still in recovery mode from Key West I waited out the Miami storm then hit Ocean Drive very much in a world pain. I felt like I was a pedestrian in the computer game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. I have never seen so many expensive and exotic cars outside of a car show. There were Bentley's, Ferrari's, Porsche's, Rolls Royce's, Maserati's and a plethora of the far more run of the mill BMW's, Mercedes, Audi's and Lexi (my attempt to come up with the plural for Lexus). There are some suitably cool period cars floating about as well. About the only car I didn't see was an Aston Martin but it's not like I was trying that hard.

The architecture is just stunning and when the sun goes down and the neon comes up it takes on another life. I've always been more a Bauhaus school design guy. The German's had their act together before WWII. I like the idea of using simple clean lines and taking into account the product you make something from with a view to not only ensuring it is eminently functional but also to hopefully improve the lot of its user and the world itself. Art Deco was always a bit more flashy and elite and dare I say it French, with the theory of thirds and symmetry coming into play. I have never witnessed deco done on such a scale before and I have to say it is really growing on me.

I needed to get some laundry done and I enquired at reception, the only option was to send it out at a cost of just shy of $200. Unless it was going to be done by lithe Cuban virgins dressed in white who smiled winsomely at me as they washed the sweat from boxer shorts there was no way I was paying that. As it seemed unlikely that would be an option, I mean there is no sweat on my boxers, I went looking for alternatives. I did a quick consult with Dr. Google and found a laundromat less than 220 feet away where I could pay $12 bucks and sit and wait for 3 hours or pay $25 bucks and pick it up tomorrow. I chose the later. What do the kids say? Mind Blownnnnn!

Going to the beach is a unique thing here. Every hotel has a resort access charge that includes a chair and a towel along with permission to use the beach. I mean it makes sense and I'm not even here in peak season and there are thousands of people. There would be a riot if we tried that in Australia though.

I had the worlds largest Bloody Mary and a gourmet pizza, followed with a lip sip suck at some tourist trap on Ocean Avenue. The Bloody Mary was $25 and the size of half a yard glass, the fire brigade could have used it to extinguish a small house blaze. It was well made but not the refreshing pre dinner drink I was hoping for. There was a nice little bar across the road from the hotel so upon completing dinner I went there and ordered a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. That about finished me for the day after my exertions in the Keys. I fell into bed and slept the righteous sleep of the drunk.

I awoke refreshed and ready to explore Miami. Breakfast was on Washington Avenue at a sidewalk cafe called Havana 1957 where I had an awesome meal. The police had cordoned off a street just around the corner where a film crew were shooting a scene. It could have been somebody or something famous but like I'd know. The cafe was far more interesting as I watched the world go by just like in Vice City. There were old bag ladies pushing shopping trolleys through busy traffic, cute girls riding motorised scooters with their hair billowing in the breeze, Cuban guys with five o'clock shadows wearing too much gold and smoking cigars, young black kids riding long handled pushbikes talking loudly on their cell phones and the entire population speaking Spanish. I even saw this old fat white guy open the door of his Lamborghini so that the young hottie he had hanging off his arm could get in. The coffee was so good I ordered another and spent a couple of hours watching the world go by.

You would seriously have to learn a few phrases of Spanish to get by here. English is very much a second language. Anyway I'm off to the beach so I can add the Atlantic Ocean to the list of places I've swum. Cue the Jaws music.