2022 Florida and More

 

"Let's do a Miami cruise in January, spend additional time in South and Central Florida, then go from there on to PCB." For some reason, this sounded like a good idea last June. We'd been vaxxed, and it was beginning to look like the Covid Pandemic, which had been becoming less intense anyway, would continue to abate. The cruise we found, a fourteen-day job from Miami to Miami, sounded wonderful, and we'd even have that extra time to spend in Florida, visiting friends and parks. PCB (Panama City Beach) is where we would spend the entire month of February.

Now it's January 2022, and that whole cruise thing doesn't sound like such a good idea anymore. The Omicron variant has caused the pandemic to renew its raging nature, even for vaxxed and boosted people such as ourselves.  Smart people are canceling cruises, and some entire cruises are being canceled, though not ours. What to do? Go on the cruise anyway, of course. What could go wrong?

This post is being written in real-time. By that, I mean that I am writing it as we go along, and I promise not to go back and do much editing. If I say something that turns out, in retrospect, to be extremely stupid, it will remain here in its nakedness for all to see, forever and ever. Amen. That said, I am going to answer my own question from the previous paragraph; here's what can go wrong by taking a cruise and spending a whole lot of the rest of the winter in Florida this year.

1) We could get very sick, and/or die of Covid-19. This seems unlikely; although vaxxed and boosted people may still get the disease, it's nearly always with mild symptoms or none at all.
2) We could be forced into quarantine. If we test positive during embarkation, we would be prevented from embarking on the voyage at all. If we test positive after we're on the ship (and we believe we will be tested frequently), we will be forced into quarantine during the cruise itself. And this can happen even if we test negative but only come in contact with someone who tests positive. The quarantine on the ship would probably not be in our nice cabin with the balcony. None of it sounds adventurous or fun at all.
3) We could test positive after the cruise. In this case, it would be up to us to decide how best to handle the situation. Of course, we would definitely not want to infect anyone else.
4) Barring any personal bouts with Covid, we may learn that cruising isn't so much fun when any or all of the following likely events occur:
    a) We may miss one or more ports of call. Some such misses wouldn't bother us much, others would.
    b) We may miss out on some of the entertainment and enrichment activities because members of the crew are out. We may manage this one okay.
    c) We probably won't be able to make close friends with other passengers as we've done on past cruises. Sharing tables with others and sharing the days' adventures has always been part of the fun of cruising for us.
    d) Other activities may also be closed down for safety, also taking more of the fun away.
5) Our stay in PCB may be much less fun due to safety concerns. For example, we will probably not go out to restaurants or be in close contact with other friends who are there with us.

And that's about all that might go wrong. At least all that I can think of. I hope none of them happens, and I also hope that I didn't miss anything. Finally, I'm hoping that the upside of cruising and touring in sunny Florida outweighs these risks. That upside includes the enjoyment of travel and warm weather. Here we go with The Story.

Congaree National Park

Smack dab in the middle of South Caroline lies Congaree National Park. It's a large area of forested wetlands that appears to be in pristine condition. After spending the night in nearby Columbia (where there was no water, but that's a different story), we arrive early, and it was pretty darn cold (mid-twenties). Luckily, there is no precipitation or wind, and the rising sun is just beginning to warm things up.

We hike the Boardwalk trail most of the way around and return via the Sims Trail for around three miles of easy strolling. The boardwalk is elevated six feet above the swampy forest floor. It's really nice, but the frost causes some parts to be slippery. The Sims trail is nice as well. We have the entire park almost entirely to ourselves, so it's nice and quiet (except for some birds) and peaceful. 

The start of the Boardwalk Trail in Congaree NP

Biscayne National Park

We "visit" the park (it's just south of Miami) by stepping into the visitor center and strolling around outside. The Ranger informs us that the short walk out to the jetty is closed, so that's that. Our usual MO for park visitations includes hiking of some sort, but that's just not gonna happen here. The park is almost all water along with a few barrier islands. There's just nowhere to go if you don't have a boat.

We do manage to park and walk outside the park. It's hot here, and we don't last long in the sun. Homestead Bay Park is adjacent to the National Park, but the entrance app is too complicated for us to figure out, so we don't stay long there either.

Biscayne NP

Everglades National Park

We had not originally planned to go here. Having visited Everglades in the past, we didn't think we'd have the time.

But we did. And glad of it. We had a free morning before boarding our ship, and we were staying surprisingly close by. From our Florida City Hotel, the visitor center was only about eight miles away. Now, walking along the Anhinga Trail (and later on the Pa-Hay-Okee Lookout Trail, we're seeing all kinds of great wetlands wildlife, including turtles, fish, and all kinds of birds. The most fun to watch? The vultures. They are super friendly and seem to just want to play. Not at all like their Hinckley cousins.

Playing with vultures in the Everglades

After our visit, we manage to get to the place where we are to park for the cruise. Surprisingly, it's in central Miami and not near the cruise port. This in spite of the awful Miami traffic. But once we get in, there is a shuttle that takes us to the ship.

<<<BEGIN OCEANIA CRUISE>>>

See the separate post for the details of the cruise. And trust me, you do not want to miss it!

<<<END OCEANIA CRUISE>>>

Everglades National Park

Yes, this seems like deja vu all over again, but it isn't. Quite.

We'd managed to get ourselves successfully disembarked and back into our car in record time, so now we had nearly an entire day to kill. Since we're staying in Florida City once again, once again we decided to visit nearby Everglades National Park just as we did the day we embarked on our cruise.

This time we drive to the very end of the park road, over to the Flamingo area. There we walk all around, looking for manatees, American crocodiles, flamingos, spoonbills, and anything else. We see nothing of the sort. Only water, wetlands, and swamps. The animals we do see instead of any of those other creatures? Mosquitoes. Billions of them. And each and every single one seems to want a piece of me.

Key West and Dry Tortugas National Park

We'd been to Key West before, but this is the first time we drove the entire length of US Route 1 from Miami. It is an interesting trip, especially with the cold, strong winds. Did I mention that here in South Florida there exist the following weather-related warnings?

1) Gale-force winds (and we can attest to their strength)

2) Wind-Chill advisory (no kidding)

3) Falling Iguana warning (yes, they really do get cold and fall from trees)

When we arrive in Key West, we walk, and walk, and walk. It's all you can do, since parking (and even driving) is 100% laughably impossible. Eventually, we locate our motel, the El Patio. It's a cheap little 2-star place that has some character. And it's the cheapest joint around at $370 a night. Then we walk some more, eventually getting dinner. It's definitely a walking town.

We are getting a tour of a huge fort. Huge. It's Fort Jefferson, a relic that was completed prior to the Civil War, but was never used in battle. The story goes that the Union General in charge came out to talk with the Confederate Naval representatives. He informed them that his powerful cannons could destroy any ship within three miles, and he advised them to go away and not come back. He convinced them, in spite of the fact that the Union Cannons had not yet been deployed. There were none at all at that time.

On top of Fort Jefferson

Fort Jefferson takes up a large percentage of Garden Key. It's all part of Dry Tortugas National Park which also includes other islands and about a hundred square miles of surrounding ocean. The fort is fantastical, and the beaches are pristine. I would have snorkeled, but getting out of the water when it's 57F would have been tough. Instead, we walk the beach almost all the way around the island. 

Birds of the Dry Tortugas

Fort Jefferson and the Yankee Freedom

I should mention that we arrived in the Dry Tortugas via the Yankee Freedom Ferry. It was a rough 2.5 hour (each way) ride but also fun and informative.

Everglades National Park

"75, 76, 77," the kids in back of us count. Then, "78, 79, 80!!" They (and we and everyone else on the tram) have counted 80 alligators. 80!

I know that you won't believe this, but we're here for the third time in about three weeks. This, when we hadn't planned to visit during this trip at all. But when we mapped out our route from Key West up to Brookville, which is North of Tampa, and on the way to Panama City Beach, we specified no tolls. So we found ourselves on Tamiami Road skirting the North Side of Everglades National Park. And so of course, we stopped at the famous Shark Valley area. As we arrived, a tram was loading to take people out to the tower viewing platform, six miles away. We quickly paid and jumped on. And began counting gators with the little kids. And having a ball. The platform was neat, but this ride is even more fun. We pull up close, very close, to the gators. We also see anhingas, great blue herons, lesser blue herons, green herons, egrets, turtles, one Burmese python, and plenty more. 

Atop the viewing platform at Everglades NP

Let's call him Big Bad Bill

<<<BEGIN PANAMA CITY BEACH VISIT>>>

We've been here in PCB for several days now. It's not as warm as points south, and it's also not terribly exciting. But it's sort of like home for us. You might say that we're all settled in now.

We met up with Iris and Mike Zielinski, along with Mike's sister Sandy Unrein right away. We often go to dinner and play games with them. Today we went to the Seaside Farmers Market where we were able to spend $11 on a loaf of bread and $3 on a tomato. $20 for a couple oz of honey also set us back a bit. But the white strawberries, called pineberries, were really good. We've also met some of the other Snowbirds: Kent and Sue from Green Bay and Sherry and Big Al from Northern Michigan. Sunsets are usually sublime, and there are shells galore.

Endless white sand beaches

Shells galore

Life's a beach

Halfway decent sunsets right out our door

There are actually plenty of great things to do around here. Yesterday we went to a different farmers market, this one in Rosemary Beach. I like to call it the "white people's farmers market," because that appears to be all... oh, never mind. It was nice anyway. And every night we step outside to watch the sunset. What? I've already mentioned the sunsets? Sorry.

Celebrating Mike's B-Day at Capt. Anderson's. L to R - Mike, Iris, Sandy, Dan, Debbie

Rosemary Beach Farmers Market

Yet another sunset

The Guess Who concert is really nifty. Even though there's only one original band member, they put on a great show, as did the opening band, The Swingin' Medallions. It's all part of the PCB Mardi Gras celebration, and the best part is, it's all free. Afterward, we stroll over to watch the parade with Iris and Mike. That's loads of fun as well. Beads galore.

Then comes the Super Bowl. It's more than just a game, it's a party as well. We go over to Sandy's place for this particular set of festivities. 

And then? Well, of course, it's Valentines' Day! This crazy fun never stops.

The traffic is awful. But the beach is serene. We've driven an hour and a half past Navarre Beach to Gulf Islands National Seashore. We have a great day for it. It's wonderful, but getting here was a bch.

By the way, GINS spans a huge length of shore from here in the Florida Panhandle over to Mississippi. For some strange reason, it skips over Alabama.

Gulf Islands National Seashore

Now, we're making the long drive to the East and South, to Mexico Beach and beyond, almost to Appalachicola. Mexico Beach never ceases to amaze; the rebuilding after the 2018 hurricane is amazing.

Mexico Beach

We're in Historic St. Andrews, and we look up to see a biplane doing stunts as if it were part of an airshow. Yet it was just for us. Well, us and a few others wandering around the farmers' market here. It's pretty cool.

We are being challenged, face-to-face, eye-contact and all, but a one-half-pound carpenter bee. It seems very menacing, but we know she can't sting. She's just defending her territory, just like some of her friends do on the elevated boardwalks here in PCB Conservation Park. Unfortunately, there isn't much other wildlife around, this time of year. We do believe that there may be more birds now, however, as February is winding down. We like Conservation Park a lot, and we come here quite often to hike. It's a huge park, and there are many miles of trails. I come here to run as well.

That should do it. It's been a pretty good trip, overall. In fact, it's been really good. We will likely be back again next year.

Here is your definitive Best-Of list for Panama City Beach:

Best Fish: Captain Andersons

Best Grouper (specifically): Salty Sue's

Best She-Crab soup: Dee's Hangout

Spiciest (but not necessarily tastiest) Cajun Food: Dee's Hangout

Best Atmosphere: Boon Docks

Best Value: Hammerhead Fred's

Best Oysters: Hammerhead Fred's

Best Gumbo: Salty Sue's

Best Steak: Dee's Hangout

Best BBQ: Dickies, but we're willing to give Back Beach BBQ another chance

Best Peel N Eat Shrimp: Winn Dixie, where they steam them for you

Oysters at Hammerhead Fred's

 

2022 Miami to Miami Cruise

 

In spite of all the best efforts to the contrary by the Devil himself, we somehow manage to get to the car parking area, get negative results on our final Covid tests, and get boarded onto the Oceania Riviera. It's a miracle, and we can't stop congratulating ourselves. The ship appears to be less than half-capacity - perhaps around 600 out of a possible 1250. This part is wonderful as well. It's nice to finally relax and enjoy the skyline of Miami as we relax and eventually disembark.

Miami Skyline as we were about to disembark

Enjoying some wine as we finally make it aboard

I am thrilled. Thrilled, I tell you. It has slowly dawned on us that there had been some changes to the cruise itinerary that we hadn't been made aware of. Now, we were skipping San Juan, Puerto Rico, Martinique, and Guadaloupe in favor of St. Kitts and Antigua. Those other places are fine, but we've been there. Now St. Kitts and Antigua, along with St. Lucia, St. Vincent, and St. Maarten will be entirely new to us. We busily book tours of the new places.

Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic

Beautiful part of the island (we've been to the southern part), but a lot of trash. Forgive me, I meant to say a LOT of trash. It's everywhere: the beach, the ocean, the roads, and the countryside. We're hearing that it's so plentiful is due to a huge rainstorm. But we're a little dubious about that. This is not to say that we are not enjoying our visit. We travel to a small county home in the hills beyond and above the city. There we tour the small home and cooking area, as well as see a wide variety of growing fruits, vegetables, herbs, and spices. We also sample the local rum, coffee, and chocolate. Yes, I try the fresh local hot chocolate drink, and (believe it or not) I love it! 

Later, we have some local food - chicken, rice, and beans - for lunch, and then make our way to the beach. The beach would be pristine had it not been for the mountains of trash. Our guide and everyone we meet is most gracious, helpful, and informative. It helps that they provide gallons of rum as we go along.

Debbie at her country home

Stunningly beautiful beach with mountains of trash

So far, so good with regards to Covid. They tested everyone on board yesterday, and although there were some positive results, we are not amongst them. Everything else is going swimmingly as well. So far. But I should add that there are a few storm clouds on the horizon. Evidently, some people on our floor, including a stateroom a few doors down, did test positive. We believe they're being quarantined, and we see people in hazmat suits visiting them from time to time.

Two and a half out of our first three and a half days are at sea. That's fairly relaxing, but it's about to change. We have ports of call for the next eight consecutive days, beginning with St. Maarten.

Phillipsburg, St. Maarten

The port area beckons, but first, we go on a tour. It's a nice one, up to the top of a mountain via a long cable-car ride, where we can see a great deal of the island as well as several other nearby islands. It's very scenic. 

After a subsequent walk/jog into town, I am very impressed with St. Maarten. It's scenic, clean, and the natives are very friendly. I was particularly impressed by the fact that I saw no hustling or bothering of tourists; just respectful selling without hassle. The town of Phillipsburg is very nice, with a great boardwalk and beach area.

St. Maarten

St. Johns, Antigua and Barbuda

Antigua and Barbuda is the country; Antigua is the island. You know. The place with 365 beaches, one for each day of the year, so long as it's not a leap year. Guess what? We're impressed with this place as well. Unlike St. Maarten, which is Dutch, this place is very British. And quite (rightly) proud of it.

We're not thrilled with it at first. It appears to be nothing at all except back-to-back houses and villages not unlike Barbados (which is yet to be visited during this trip). Not bad, but not particularly pretty. But then we arrive on the opposite side of the island for some scenic views and a tour of the harbor. It's all wonderful. We'd come back here to visit too.

Antigua

Bridgetown, Barbados

We've been to Barbados a couple of other times, once for a whole week. Yet here we are on the Best of Barbados tour, and in spite of our familiarity, it's not bad. We tour the Mount Gay Rum Distillery and Sunbury Great House, Tropical Gardens, and Gun Hill Signal Station. Although the scenery is not quite as spectacular as the previous ports, it's still very nice. The gardens everywhere are lovely as well.

I should say, however, that I'm getting quite sick of rum punches. Not that I ever loved them to begin with.

It's sail-away time. The Captain comes on to make an announcement: "We are not going to sail to Grenada tonight due to their high numbers of Covid cases. Instead, we will continue to stay here in Barbados for tonight and tomorrow." Further, "We will not conduct the St. Vincent Covid testing scheduled for tomorrow." All this has us wondering. Is it really that we don't want to go to Grenada, or is it possible that they just don't want us? And why would St. Vincent remove their testing requirement? Is it possible that we're not going to go there, either? We enquire about the latter question and as (somewhat) reassured that we are indeed still going to St. Vincent. Let's hope so.

Since we don't have any tours for this second day in Barbados, we take a long walk through Bridgetown and over to the beach. We even cross a few of the bridges for which the town gets its name. It's all lovely early in the morning. I follow that up for a run along the same route.

The beach in Bridgetown, Barbados

It's just a little before sail-away time. The Captain comes on to make an announcement (this time everyone holds their collective breath): "We are not going to visit St. Vincent, St. Lucia, and St. Kitts due to their high numbers of Covid cases. Instead, we will stop in St. Maarten again, and Tortola, British Virgin Islands. We will still visit St. Barts. We will have an additional day at sea." Although we have wanted to visit the BVI, we wanted to go to St. Vincent, St. Lucia, and St. Kitts more. This is very disappointing.

This morning's sunrise

New Itin and the old one had already been changed

We will just have to suffer through this. Seriously, as long as we are able to safely disembark from this ship, we'll be happy. We are truly having fun visiting the places that we are still getting to, and making friends amongst our fellow travelers. And as they say, the food ain't bad.

Road Town, Tortola, British Virgin Islands (BVI)

We'd had the thought that this would be the best of our ports of call, and guess what? It is. As much as we've enjoyed the others (perhaps St. Maarten most of all), the island of Tortola has them all beat. It turns out that the BVI is a great booby prize to compensate for missing St. Vincent, St. Kitts, and St. Lucia.

We begin by going up to Mount Sage National Park, site of the highest point on Tortola. This park was created by a grant from Laurance Rockefeller. Our tour leader takes us on a steep, muddy, and difficult one-mile hike to the top, where the views of the surrounding British and American Virgin Islands are magnificent.

View of the surrounding Virgin Islands from Mount Sage

After a rum punch, we motor down to Cane Garden Bay to enjoy a wonderful beach. And, of course, another rum punch.

Of all the places we've visited on this trip, the BVI is the one we'd like to return to the most.

The beach at Cane Garden Bay

And by the way. We play team trivia every day with some friends we've met. It's tons of fun.

Our Team Trivia Group (John, Theresa, Jenny, Peter, Debbie, Dan, Margo, Marc)

Gustavia, St. Barts

We’ve just gone ashore in hoity-toity St. Barts (home of the rich and famous), our final port. We will now have two days at sea before disembarking in Miami. It’s remarkable that we’ve managed to stay Covid-free, at least as far as we know. We’re trying hard to stay that way. And since the ship is only half-full, so it’s the best of all worlds. Already, we miss Tortola in the British Virgin Islands, which was grand. We’d go back there in an instant. St. Maarten and Antigua were tied for second.

And have I mentioned that the food’s been okay? We are trying to limit ourselves to one added pound per day. That way we’ll keep our weight gain to no more than fourteen pounds, total. Each

The Harbor in Gustavia

Walking in Gustavia

St. Barts

We are back in Miami and about to disembark. Other than the minor disappointments, it's been a wonderful cruise experience. Oceania Cruises did a marvelous job of keeping everyone, most notably us, as utterly happy as clams. Their service and food are unsurpassed. We had fun meeting new friends on board, especially when playing team trivia. And we enjoyed the ports of call. Of course, the best part of all is that we managed to (as far as we know) stay Covid-free. 

We are slightly concerned that Oceania and their parent company, NCL may be in at least some financial trouble. They certainly don't do well when a ship is only half-full like this one. The entire cruise industry is suffering losses; we just hope Oceania survives.

One final concern is for our car. We used Cruise Safe Parking in central Miami and we just hope the return all works out as it's supposed to.

P.S. Picking up the car manages to work out. We made it!