As a US Airways Credit Card holder, I get offered a companion pass every year. This allows me to purchase a plane ticket and 2 people can tag along for $99 each. My lifetime friends, Courtney and Julie, have always shared my obsession with traveling and so I sent an email to see where this companion pass would take us. We started on Jetsetter to get ideas. We thought about Arizona, Texas, the northeast area, but we decided we wanted warm and interesting. We booked our flights to Miami for October 27th-30th, 2011. We were ready to start planning our Key West vacation!!
I was walking down King Street in Charleston, I'll never forget where I was when I received THE call. It was Julie letting me know her discovery. We had planned our Key West vacation, unbeknownst to us, during Fantasy Fest 2011. Ummm, 'what is Fantasy Fest?' I asked Julie. She referred me to the website and the rest is history. Due to this revelation, we had a very tough time finding a hotel in Key West that didn't cost more than a small car. We decided we did infact want to participate* in Fantasy Fest 2011, but maybe for just 1 night. We went on a 'Key Crawl' and stayed 1 night in each location: Key West, Duck Key, and Miami. We flew into Miami, rented a car, and hit the road. The drive was about 3 hours and we stopped in Key Largo for lunch. I was a little taken back by the quality (and lack there of) of the restaurants, shops, residential areas of all the places we drove through. But the drive is a MUST if you have never done it. Going from key to key was pretty magnificent.
Key West:
It was mine and Courtney's first time to Key West. Julie had been there before so she was our tour guide. We arrived as mother nature decided to pour buckets of water on us. Fortunately the rain stopped before our night on Duval Street. Our hotel, Santa Maria, was an absolute gem and we were one block from the quiet end of Duval Street. We were greeted with a glass of wine around the pool and a sheet for the toga party, one of the Fantasy Fest events. We declined the sheet, but welcomed an overdue glass of wine. Our hotel room was not a room at all. It was a condo with 2 floors, 2 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms and a fully stocked kitchen. We all fell in love with the decor. I would highly, highly recommend this place (and look for deals on jetsetter). Here are some pictures:
As for our night on the town....
We started out at a bar called La Te Da at the 'quiet end' of Duval street. It was an outside bar and the weather was cooperating with us at this point. It was heavenly to finally sit down and relax and feel as if we were on vacation! Julie found a restaurant for us on Urban Spoon, nine one five, and it exceeded any expectation I could have dreamed up. We had to have set some sort of record for how fast a cheese plate can be demolished. It was the most amazing cheese plate we had ever had placed before us and we were tempted to order another for dessert. I ordered their signature dish, the Tuna Dome...fresh dungeness crab with a lemon miso dressing wrapped in ahi tuna sashimi. I may purchase a plane ticket to Key West for this dish. It was absolutely Heaven in my mouth.
and then......it happened....
We left the restaurant with no destination and there it was. All the naked people, body paint, head pieces, etc. There are no words to describe what we saw. No words. If you enjoy people watching as much as me, this is the place to be. There were as many naked and painted old people as there were young. SHAME does not exist on Duval Street. During Fantasy Fest anyway. As much as I would like to share the pictures of the freaks people who provided our entertainment for the evening, this says it all....
We woke up Friday morning and after rehashing what we had seen the night before we got ready and ventured to yet another Julie recommendation, Banana Cafe. Brunch was delicious and the people are exceptionally nice. When I think I finally have pulled my jaw up off the floor from Thursday night, we found ourselves back on Duval Street to perhaps do some window shopping. And out of no where I was slapped in the face by yes, a painted breast. Y'ALL! The 'day-time Fantasy Fest' is just as extreme as the 'night-time Fantasy Fest'. Jaw on ground again. Speechless, we continued to Ernest Hemingway's home, end of Hwy 1, and Kino (Julie already has some in every color) for some souvenirs.
Duck Key:
Late Friday, we left Key West and all the naked people for some rest and relaxation. We drove North to Hawk's Cay at Duck Key. This was a resort we found on Jetsetter. The weather didn't cooperate as well as we would have liked, but we were able to sit by the pool for a bit before we headed to dinner. We ate at the marina and the food was so-so. There really is no night life and a massive storm came in so we headed back to our room and curled up in the bed, ordered some room service ice cream, and waited for Dateline. Ahhhh. So relaxing and I think I slept for 11 hours....I suppose this is what vacation is supposed to feel like. We got up and laid out by the lagoon on Saturday,watched the dolphin show, ate lunch and then headed to Miami.
Miami:
Traffic was a nightmare, but we finally arrived in Miami. We showered and headed for South Beach for drinks and dinner. Julie suggested we get a cocktail at The Betsy Hotel so we obliged. We enjoyed the lobby's decor and a glass of bubbly. We walked around South Beach, rather unimpressed, and started looking up restaurants. I found an italian restaurant that served gluten-free pasta and I was all over that. We ended up at Spiga. About the time we found our table (outside on a covered patio), the flood gates opened up and it poured rain for what would be the remainder of our evening. Dinner was great, our waiter was better (we all had a crush on him, but Courtney found herself hitting on him). We had an outstanding anitposto misto (antipasta plate in layman terms) with mozzarella, tomato, prosciutto, olives, cantaloupe, brie, asiago, parmesan cheese, and homemade marmalade. Add a good bottle of wine and GF pasta, it was a wonderful dinner. Since the rain was relentless, we decided to watch the Gamecocks back at the hotel. We won, Clemson lost...and I had m&ms in the bed. Perfect night!
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| Julie, at her best (the only picture I took of all 3 of us) |
G has always said travelling isn't about the destination, but the journey and company. I couldn't have had better travel companions and it was a refreshing girls trip. Thanks Julie and Courtney for a wonderful Journey. Let me know when you're ready for our next one....love you both.
*we didn't understand what participation would require. We did NOT, in fact, participate...in anything!
