We had planned a late start at the Embassy Suites in Fort Lauderdale but I was awake early as I was still on UK time.
At 6 am I had both emails and messages as I was not alone in having issues with email from my website. A quick WhatsApp call explained that the issue was an earlier than planned move of my website to another host server. This was by the hosting company and was not agreed to have have happened so soon. Resolution of email issues will have to wait now till I get home. After making a cup of tea I tried to catch up on some more sleep.
Our cruise through the Panama Canal started in Fort Lauderdale and would take us to Aruba, Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico and finally San Francisco and then onto Monterey.
On Day 3 Wednesday 11th October were still in Fort Lauderdale and went to the beach, had more shopping and then a rest by the pool.
Embassy Suites
I looked out of the window and at 9.40 saw this rainbow at the side of us.
Breakfast was later than the day before and by then the Atrium was even more busy if that was possible.
The fresh cooking counter was interesting to watch as the staff tried to marshal guests to stand in the same order for pickup as they had ordered their food. One guest lost it when they received a spinach and cheese omelette rather than their ordered spinach and egg white only omelette. I stuck to a simple cheese and mushroom omelette.
We rode the lift up to the 12th floor of the hotel to have a look at the ocean past the buildings on the shoreline. This floor of rooms was busy as workers were replacing carpets damaged by water coming into the hotel when Hurricane Irma had passed by.
As we watched the drawbridge came up to allow a yacht to pass through.
To the beach
Once we had picked up our bags we set off for 17th Street where we planned to catch the Sun Trolley bus to the beach. We had walked a block up from the hotel and the trolley bus turned off and went down the side street to the Harbor Shops.
Our mistake was instead of walking down to the shops we walked back down SE 17th Street to wait for the next trolley bus. Down the street we stood and watched these birds feeding along the side of the street.
The traffic was heavy heading out.
After picking us up, the trolley bus then turned down to the shops and after a short wait did come back out on the same street to 17th and turned towards the beach. Our driver was originally from the Caribbean and had spent holidays in the UK visiting relatives and he chatted to us for the rest of the trip. He showed us where the streets had been buried in sand to a depth pf 3 feet or more by the hurricane.. At the side of Fort Lauderdale Beach Boulevard we could see the enormous piles of sands that been removed form the surrounding roads.
The beach
We left the trolley bus at the cross road with Los Olas Boulevard and began our walk along the Beach Boulevard with palm trees fringing the beach.
Out on the ocean there were large ships anchored just off shore. The wind was strong and as we walked we could see the waves crashing onto the beach.
If the flags next to the lifeguard station were to be believed then the beach was closed for bathers because of dangerous marine life.
We continued walking until the Boulevard turned for the Galleria mall on Sunrise Boulevard and we were passed by the beach patrol on bikes.
We then turned and headed back until we reached an almost empty restaurant, Ibiza restaurant, and we went in for a sit down and a well deserved cup of coffee (and not particularly good either.)
After our break we went up Los Olas Boulevard to the drawbridge and stopped to look at the shore side houses and moored yachts.
This was the sticker on the pedestrian crossing.
