Vacation, All I Ever Wanted (Part 2)

No matter where you go in the world, if there is a playground, your two year old will notice and want to go. If you're suckers like we are, you will be thrilled by the fact that your son has now reached a point where he will ask for something like park time and you will take him. Luckily, when you are on Key Biscayne, which is not at all the real world, even the parks are something to wonder at.

I know it's silly but I did feel kind of weird being on vacation and spending an afternoon at a playground. Still, it was a little too chilly for the ocean, we had been at the pool and the park was right across from the hotel. We did end up seeing a lot of familiar faces- faces we knew from the hotel- so I guess I felt better knowing that this was a normal thing and that we weren't being totally lame. Someone once said to me that vacationing with baby/toddler just means doing all your normal stuff but in a different location. There is definitely some truth to that, but for Turtle and I the beauty of vacation is the fact that we get to have Daddy with us 24 hours a day, which is not at all the case in day-to-day life.

As I mentioned, this park was Key Biscayne super deluxe. No offense meant to Proctor or Donovan, but wow. This place even made the Green Monster at Memorial Park look shabby. Truitt was thrilled by every new adventure and was sure to get a turn on every toddler sized attraction.

Starting with what looked like familiar ground; but "WHOA, this slide is bumpy!"

Cool stuff to climb; Turtle wonders how to make an everyday slide just that much more exciting; time for a water break with Mama

"Hmmmmm.... What else can I try out at this most awesome of all awesome parks?"

"Never seen these crazy kinds of things before"; Little monkey boy

"Check out my new drum kit"; "Hey, baby. Wanna be in my band?"

"You're cute. I like older girls"; but Mama is always his best girl!

Cruising in the pink Cadillac; "watch me get some mean whip lash on this sucker!" (Really, Mama says. This went way faster and way more... back and forth than any of these that we have in Houston and the kid was completely on fire on it)


So, yes. We had major kid time. Luckily we were able to get some nice adult time in as well. We read on line that the hotel had sitting services and we have used a sitter at a hotel before, so this was something we planned on. A couple days before we left for vacation, I started to get cold feet. Being unsure of how far the hotel was from Miami proper, I started to worry about what we would do in emergency. I worried about Turtle in a strange city. I worried about something happening to us and not having anyone else in Miami who could help Truitt (unlike Austin where we have used a hotel sitter but also have friends and family). However, when we got to the hotel, a lot of my nerves were calmed. Ray spoke to a couple of families at the pool who had used the sitter services and recommended one in particular. Add to that the fact that the travel time between South Beach and the hotel was only about 30 minutes and I was sold. Time for a date night.

Before Mama and Dada left, Turtle got to order some room service. Fancy!

Ready to head out. No, the yellow Lamborghini was not ours. Ha!

Ray thought dinner at NOBU might be a fun experience. It was great and definitely an experience. The restaurant is in an unmarked hotel with no signs or directions on how to get from the lobby to the restaurant. When you finally feel like enough of a jerk to ask someone, they tell you "follow the path to the end and take a left" but that actually gets you to the Italian place at the hotel without a sign and you have to ask again.... Ugh. It was funny but annoying at the same time. NOBU doesn't take reservations, so we were kind of winging it. Luckily, we are still on family time and got there about 45 minutes before the party crowd arrived to get some dinner. We were seated immediately, which was great because we were hungry but also b/c you had to pay the damn valet $24 in advance.

Ray really summed up the experience best after dinner. It wasn't superlative, but it was very good, bordering on great. We sampled some sushi and I think the thing about sushi is if the fish is fresh and high quality, it's good. There isn't much you can do. We also had some tempura. Good. Not great. Here are the highlights of the meal:

The Miso Soup: It was seriously out of this world. Flavor- mmmmmm. I would say probably the best Miso I have ever had. Ray agreed.

Entrees: Ray's Sea Bass with Black Bean sauce. He said also one of the best fish dishes he has ever had. He said everything about it worked perfectly and I know he meant it b/c he ooooed and ahhhhed it the whole time he was eating. My scallops were solidly good, but nothing about them made me jump out of my seat. Still, it's always nice to have food that is well prepared.

Desserts: Not something I usually get at a sushi restaurant, but the sweets menu was just too tempting to pass up. Sadly, they were out of the Bento Box, which was what I really wanted. Luckily, the other options were just as good. Banana Spring roll with chocolate, passion fruit puree for dipping and sesame ice cream. Wow. It was all sooooo good. The sesame ice cream was really different. I liked it a lot; Ray loved it. Tempura Chocolate. Yeah that was right up my alley. Chocolate fried in dough, served with raspberry puree and almond ice cream. Wow and double wow. A great way to end a nice dinner.

Like the old, boring people we are, we headed straight back to the hotel after dinner (and awesome people watching, by the way). We still has some time before our minimum for the sitter was up, so we decided to have a drink at the RUMBAR in the hotel. Ray was intrigued b/c he used to be a big rum drinker, but in the last several years his rum knowledge has been replaced with wine knowledge. He was excited by the prospect of over 85 rums on their menu. While I got a sparkling water, Ray decided to try a flight. I'm sure he was thinking what I was thinking- little tasting glasses, a couple of sips in each. Well, the damn thing had its own apparatus! I cracked up when it came to the table. I think I was so amused by the rack of booze that my amusement even amused our waiter. It was so glorious I had to have a picture:

Poor Ray barely made a dent in all this rum, but it was fun to watch him try. I'm glad he enjoyed trying something new. Plus, it was great to add a little quiet time to the end of our date night. We went back to the room at pretty much 11pm on the dot to find a sleeping Turtle, totally exhausted from staying up late and all the Kung Fu Panda he could handle, and a college age babysitter watching Mtv. I don't think I have tuned my television to Mtv in at least 5 years. It really made me feel old....

Vacation was quickly winding down. The end of the week brought the best weather. Of course. We also had some gorgeous sunsets.

The trip went by entirely too fast and I was so not ready to come home. The weather was really peeking... just as we were packing. I could have stayed another 5 days easily. I know that sounds like a no-brainer, but I am really the kind of person who starts to long for her own bed after time. Just not this time.

There are too many places to see and things to do at this point in our lives to have repeat destinations, but travelling with kids I can really see us heading back to Key Biscayne in the future. As you can see here, Turtle felt the same about heading home as I did:

The difference is I stayed sad about it. Turtle was over it as soon as he got to pretend to drive the rental car: