There’s nothing like getting back on land after a sea voyage..don’t believe me? just ask the passengers on the Carnival ship Triumph. Sorry I couldn’t resist throwing that in. If we’d gone to Cozumel out of Texas instead of Miami we could have been on board that ship.
But now our cruise was over, Joe was on his way back to Orlando and I was on my way to find the Ramada Inn in Fort Lauderdale. Road construction is the bane of GPS navigation. That “oh so proper ” british voice saying turn right or turn left where instead of a road you find a Jersey Barrier! I am expecting a bill from the Florida Turnpike any day. I can’t tell you how many times following the “Keep Left” or Keep right” instruction put me in the “Easy Pass lane” with no place to pay the toll and no place to turn around! In spite of the mishaps I eventually found my way to the correct Ramada Inn where I was sent packing…in the nicest, politest way. Check-in wasn’t until 3pm. I’m so sorry but there’s no available room yet.
That’s ok it was almost lunch time and oh happy days…there’s a Golden Corral nearby. Weekday lunches must not be too busy as there was no line and lots of tables. Even at an all your can eat buffet eventually you need to leave and it still wasn’t 3pm.
At that point I did what any self-respecting TV fan would do. I went looking for Holiday Park in the Everglades.
Holiday Park is “Home of the Gator Boys” but if you have followed that reality show you know that at the end of last season the park was taken over by the county and the Gator Boys took their show to Mississippi.
Well I’ve hung in there through this season but I don’t like the Mississippi episodes as much as Florida so I wanted to see if anyone knew if they were going to be coming back to Holiday Park.
I found Holiday Park with less trouble than I had finding the hotel and began exploring. There isn’t a lot to see, the airboats, a souvenir shop, a little store that sells snacks and a fence with a sign advertising gator wrestling.
When you take a ride on an airboat the cost of the gator wrestling show is included in the ticket price. As I stood in line to buy my ticket I thought I recognized one of the other people in line to check out. But why would one of the Gator Boy characters (are the people in reality shows actors?) be in line to pay for snacks? I decided I must be wrong , took my ticket and wandered down to the airboat dock snapping pictures as I went and enjoying the fact that I was really at Holiday Park.
It was a beautiful afternoon for an airboat ride, not too hot, sunny…just perfect. I found I was really looking forward to getting out on the sea of grass again. I’d been on an airboat ride about 10 years ago and again about 3 years ago. One Floridian said “why?” you’ve seen it once. But each ride is different. A lot depends on your guide and there’s so much to see in the Everglades.