Florida Keys and South Beach

Florida Keys and South Beach

We took a week+ break from the real world and visited South Florida for Thanksgiving weekend. The trip started in the South Beach area of Miami. After a night of dining and drinks in South Beach, we had planned on driving south to the Florida Keys for our primary destination on this trip the next morning.

Another Rental Car Nightmare

My brother-in-law organized a rental car for the trip. After arriving at the Miami airport and the long walk to the baggage claim area, we had another long walk to the rental car center. They were doing maintenance on most of the moving sidewalks and people movers between the areas. Therefore, that added a delay in getting to the rental car center. The delay wasn’t due to me checking a backpack as it was referenced several times by my fellow travelers on the trip. However, it probably didn’t help the situation below.

Rental car issues have happened again, similar to the Vegas trip. Once we arrived at the rental car center, we realized that our car was at an off-airport location. Therefore, we had to take a shuttle to the car rental location after notifying them we had arrived. Again, this was another delay. At this point, we were well over an hour since walking off the plane to get to the car rental location. After a short wait in line, he made it to the front. They only hold the car for an hour after your reservation time and they had given the car away already. Needless to say, there were no happy campers in our group.

No Car, Now What? How will we get to the Florida Keys?

We looked online to see if we could get another car while there and we couldn’t. So, we grabbed an Uber to the hotel in South Beach to unwind and make backup plans. We were able to find another car in downtown Miami and made a reservation for pickup the next morning. Due to the late booking over the Thanksgiving weekend, we paid a premium for the vehicle, it was almost 3x the price of the previous one.

Southbound to the Keys

We checked out of the hotel and took an Uber to get the rental car in Miami. Upon arrival, they didn’t have the car we had booked which was a large SUV due to the limited options available. They did have an extra large SUV available, so we took it and loaded our crap in the back. Finally, we are heading south to the Keys for the next 6 days. We did a couple of day trips to Key West from where we were staying in Cudjoe Key.

Back to Miami

After spending 6 days in the Keys, we headed back to Miami for the last 2 nights of the trip. We found a great apartment to stay in the pedestrian-only area of Espanola Way.

Florida Keys Ain’t Cheap

As you can see below, the airfare was barely $100 per person. Unfortunately, accommodations, food, and drinks are expensive in South Florida. I finally got to see the Florida Keys and Key West, so I guess that is something.

Itinerary

* indicates where we stayed at least one night

Day 1

Miami South Beach *

Day 2 – 7

Cudjoe Key

2x day trips to Key West

Day 7-9

Miami *

Fort Lauderdale

Budget (estimated)

Please check out my videos on YouTube from this and other trips.