South Miami, Little Havana!!

One day this week decided to take a scenic route to Miami searching for Little Havana! Little Havana is an area in southwest Miami which was established during the Cuban Revolution in the '50s, populated by Cubans and also South American immigrants. Soaking up the culture as evidenced by the hand-making of Cuban cigars, the historical Domino Park where local men and women play dominoes, checkers, and chess and have since the 50's. Sat at a local cafe sipping on Cuban coffee "much like Expresso" and sampling their special pastries and people watching which was the best! While sitting there Janet noticed a small Cuban or Hispanic man walking towards her with a W.W.II cap on, after taking a good look he was an Army Veteran. He noticed her attention to his cap and he smiled and she properly saluted him. He smiled even bigger! That was special to her and hopefully to him!

We both noticed how the men were taking a daily morning walk with a special friend and while talking and also laughing they would touch each other on the shoulder or back! Ty noticed men carrying large camera equipment and chased them down asking what they were there for! They responded "an upcoming story was being taped for the Travel Channel about Little Havana". They were filming a man who was selling coconuts off the back of his pickup truck. He cracked it with a meat cleaver while holding it in his palm, dug out the top and inserted a straw and handed one to each member of the filming crew! He used great skill with this cleaver!!! You could also tell that this made his day knowing that this would be shown on the Travel Channel!

One of the goals of this blog is to tell of our interactions with people of this great country! While we were trying to parallel park Silver a meter-man assisted us and gave us 2 hours of free parking. Another couple stepped out into heavy traffic just to assist us in backing out of a difficult place!! While driving home some people at a traffic light motioned to us holding up a sign saying that they were Bronco fans and smiling! They asked where we were going and we asked them where the turnpike was and they said, "Just Follow Us!"

For our knowledge about this day, we googled The Bay of Pigs later and about the Cuban Mission Crisis which both occurred during our childhoods and were mentioned in the little park on signs and a statue.

"The Funnies"
To battle insects in Silver, Ty purchased some old fashioned fly tapes which farmers used to hang over their kitchen tables during the 50's to catch flies. The only thing trapped in the tape was Ty's face, arm, and neck on three different entrapments during the middle of the night!! This was a total cost of $2.00 for entertainment and the damn thing went quickly into the trash!

A Poem by Janet!
Closed my eyes thinking about the condition of blindness,
Opened them
in full appreciation!
Looking up into the Mangrove tree branches....
The sun had tinted
each leaf's tip
with silver!

Thought for the day on Ty's 65th Birthday from a birthday card from Janet.

The world is grand, awfully big
and astonishingly beautiful,
frequently thrilling!
D. Kilgallen

After two weeks of rest in Key Largo, Silver has been watered, fed, and groomed and ready to head out again! The next road will take us deep into the Everglades through Christmas.