This is our third trip in our new Winnebago Minnie. We also went to St. Augustine and the panhandle. I didn’t write about either of these trips due to laziness. I was also very put out when we travelled to the panhandle because people were so lax in following CDC guidelines. However, it is now time to write again. We are staying at the Miami Everglades RV resort. It is pretty full. As I walked around this evening, I noticed that most RVs are from other states. This place is known for renting through the winter, so I assume they are here for that reason. It’s a really nice resort with shuffleboard courts, mini golf course, horseshoes, basketball hoop, pool, hot tub, and pickle ball courts. There is even a walking trail that I saw people running the other day. We are not here for all those amenities though. We are here to explore.

Today we started at Vizcaya Museum and Gardens. Vizcaya was built by the Deerings. The gardens are magnificent. They reminded me of gardens I have seen in Europe.

The house itself only has the first floor open. They are working on the second for restoration. It looks like they are slowly working on the entire estate to bring it back to the beauty it once was. My favorite part of the outdoors was this boat made of stone.

You can see where lots of people could sit and perhaps watch a performance in the middle of the ship. Sadly they still need to work on this boat since the right hand side is filled with grasses. We read that sometimes you can see manatees in the water next to the ship.

The inside of the house was neat to see. The middle of it was once all open to the outside in the true Spanish style. They have now put giant windows where it was once open air. Most of the floors are marble and the doorways are like tiny hallways into the next room. The rooms themselves are fashioned after different eras and countries. They likened the living room to a French chalet. The music room was designed for the baroque time period. Of course we were walking behind an older couple who thought it was a good idea to open all the cabinets in the pantry area. I still can’t believe the audacity of people.

After touring the house and gardens, we went to see a Spanish monastery. This was built in the 1200s in Spain. They brought it over to the U.S. in pieces and rebuilt it in Miami. It reminded us of being in Spain, which was lovely. There were so many girls dressed up for their quinceañera, posing for photos while we were there. One girl looked like Cinderella and there was a boy with her dressed as a prince. I had never seen that before. There were also a good number of cats roaming around and soaking up the sun. Inside the building, they had a number of artifacts from the 1200s that belonged to the monastery, such as candlesticks, a giant hymnal, helmets, and even an ancient hearse.

After the monastery we drove around Wynnwood. I love the amount of creativity that we saw on all the storefronts and random walls. It was unreal. There were so many that I would have liked to photograph that it was too many. The only pictures I took were these:

We also drove down to Miami Beach and through Calle 8. It was getting near rush hour so it was a bit crazy driving. I would have liked to walk around Miami Beach area, hopefully in the future we will have a chance to stay in that area and walk around. Calle 8 was neat to see since we just watched a special on it by Marcus Lemonis, who grew up in that area.

The other cool part about staying in this RV resort is because it is located in the area of Miami with all the nurseries. There is not a lot else over in this area in terms of eating, drinking, and shopping, but the area is beautiful and quiet. It is also very close to the Everglades and some other cool attractions. I am very much looking forward to going to the Robert Is Here fruit stand and getting a fruit milkshake!