Adding some spice to our trip

There was one day of the trip that Craig had to leave us for almost the whole day but that wasn’t going to stop Lucy and I from having fun on our own. We headed out to the Fruit and Spice park. It was a little out of town and I was a worried about driving in Miami but since the trip only involved 3 turns I thought I could handle it. Turns out the drive itself wasn’t bad but even with only a little traffic, my directions miscalculated how long the trip would take. The supposed 35 minute trip took almost an hour! Luckily Lucy was in a good mood and the place ended up being really cool so it was worth it.

Despite what this picture might seem to illustrate, we both had a fun time.
It is quite large and full of lots of exotic fruits and spices. You can walk around and eat anything you find on the ground as long as you know what it is.

Here we are in a banana forest

Before our tour started, Lucy and I found a banana and an avocado. (Too bad she isn’t 3 months older since those the two solids I’m planning on starting her with!) Even though she didn’t taste it, Lucy really enjoyed exploring the avocado.

Mom, there is something green and slimy on my finger.

But the best way to see the park is the tram tour like we did, you get to see the whole park without having to walk too much and they will show you what most things are and pick some for you to try. I was brave and tried everything that was offered, most of which I can not remember the name of. But this is dead man’s fingers.

It looks gross but tastes kinda like a kiwi. There was even one that tasted just like cotton candy. We also got to smell lots of the spices, including one that smelled like licorice and lemon allspice which smells exactly like of lemon pinesol. It was a bit freaky actually. After the tour, we headed back to the gift shop for some locally made mango ice cream then drove back to the hotel for a nap before Craig returned.
We also had some non-beach fun on our last day of the trip. Craig was free in the morning and our flight wasn’t until 3 but we didn’t want to bother going to the beach then having to clean up afterwards so we went on a little walking tour of the Art Deco area near South Beach.


Of course, all the information about the walk was in our tour guide so with that and my large camera, we were not inconspicuous in our touristiness but we just went with it!
Since it was a weekday morning, the place was pretty calm and with Lucy asleep on me it was a nice way to end our mini-vacation.