South Beach 2 - the Dorchester

A disappointing last breakfast at the News Cafe before checking out of the Pelican. I should have read the menu more carefully - replacing the hollandaise with cream cheese on eggs florentine was not one of the chef's better ideas...

The art deco walking tour was also not the best, I think our guide 'Kent' needs to lose the script and freshen up the jokes.

A short taxi ride later and we are in the Dorchester on Collins north of Lincoln Road, a bigger hotel with a pool and beach access via its sister hotel the Marseilles. We resist the $1 specials at the bar and head up Lincoln Road for stroll before our planned trip to Little Havana.

The bus interchange downtown is confusing so we opt for a cab. Not a whole lot to see in Little Havana - some old Cuban guys playing dominoes, art galleries and Cuban diners and bars - a quick tortilla Espanol and then we jump on a bus downtown, just as a text arrives from my mother warning against the murder dangers if downtown Miami! We change buses, avoiding various fellow travellers with mental health problems and return to the safety of South Beach.

For the evening's activities a bar crawl of the high end hotels is planned, starting with the Ritz Carlton de Lido bar (closed), the Sagamore (deserted), the Delano Rose Bar (livelier), the Delano Florida Room - designed by Lennie Kravitz - (closed for refurbishment), the National (empty), the Raleigh (empty). Not exactly wall to wall Beyonce and JLo! We draw the line at the Catalina - (KFed sightings) and head up Lincoln Road, dropping into Five Napkin Burger, home of the legendary 10oz burger - opting for the fish tacos before heading home to bed.

Thursday up bright and not so early for a morning by the pool. The heat got the better of me after a couple hours and I headed for shops.

The evening's highlight was dinner at Sushi Samba - the Japanese Peruvian Brazilian fusion restaurant featured in Sex & The City. Amazing food and great cocktails, we then headed down to The Palace on Ocean Drive for a sidewalk drag act - lots of big hair and lip syncing whilst a family tucked into cheeseburger and fries seemingly oblivious!

Friday was cloudy and pretty uneventful, early night required prior to the super early start on Saturday to catch the 08.00 train to Orlando.

Charleston to Raleigh and back again

One hour late, and after eight hours on the train, I arrive at Charleston's not so buzzing Amtrak station, my friends are waiting for me in the freezing cold - this makes me feel even more guilty about being late, especially as I need to be taken to the airport to pick up my rental car.

At the Budget desk the assistant is desperate for me to have an upgrade - I resist knowing that gas is not as cheap as it used to be and I have a long trip to Raleigh NC ahead of me.

The next few days are full of catch ups with friends - including the aforementioned nine hour round trip to Raleigh NC - mixed up with hanging out around Charleston. A trip to Folly Beach was just as deserted as it always was and the city was pretty much unchanged - happy memories.

I made time for a few purchases, including a bargain $85 Kindle at Walmart. I eagerly headed to Starbucks to use the free wifi and set it up with my Amazon UK account - just to check it wasn't restricted because of the price. No problem at all and in less than 10 minutes I had downloaded about 20 books.

Obviously I purchased a drink before hooking up to the wifi. In the queue in front of me was a woman who ordered a Venti latte with two shots of vanilla, two shots of caramel and two shots of hazelnut, the incredulous sales assistant queried "that is just a regular latte, right?", the barista then queried it too. I think the subtext was "would you like some coffee with your bucket of milk, sugar and artificial flavourings?"

That said flavoured syrups seem to de rigour in Charleston - every coffee I ordered came with the question "would you like syrup with that?" kind of like an updated and more middle class version of "would you like fries with that?" I guess. Though the best had to be at Charleston Airport where, when purchasing coffee, I was asked "would you like some pizza with that?"

A fun week overall, only marred by the development of the head cold from hell, which is still with me now.