Fort Lauderdale is a booming yacht town with an extraordinarily high number of gay and nudist people as well as transgender and other kinds of "non-traditional" sexual orientations, especially amongst the Couchsurfing community. I only paid a relatively short visit to Miami and Hollywood. Unfortunately, my original wish to find a boat here did not come true, but I did get a lot of insights into a world that has been rather strange for me so far by hanging out with almost only gay people and going to a naturist beach.
Overall I stayed with four different hosts within just four days in Fort Lauderdale, "the Venice of America", and then for four days with one couple in Hollywood. This was due to the fact that I had sent dozens of requests to people living here to not only stay with them but asking for recommendations how and where to find boats. Many Couchsurfers invited me to stay with them as Ft Lauderdale has a very active Couchsurfing community. In Hollywood and especially Miami instead it was very difficult to find hosts to stay with. Especially Miami is too much in demand so local hosts are extremely picky whom they offer to host, some of them for example just host females, for obvious reasons. Most people just declined my request without even giving an answer although I've written personal messages. But let's start with Ft Lauderdale and Sebastian from Colombia who took me out to two gay karaoke bars where we practiced our tunes. Furthermore we had typical American food at an IHOP as well as a Colombian dish.
Sebastian took me to the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood which covers 100 acres of land. This complex with its enormous casino, poker room, discotheques, pool and spa facilities, bars, restaurants and shops embodies life in the Miami metropolitan region. Currently a large expansion project is ongoing, with new facilities scheduled to open within the next weeks and months. The recently erected main building in the form of a guitar, which can be seen from everywhere and characterizes the cityscape, was a controversial project. At night, laser projections are displayed into the sky, showing the guitar neck.
After that we visited the Secret Woods Nature Center, a urban wilderness area in Dania Beach which lets you escape from the general rush of urban life. The area is a mature forest with large laurel oaks, fig trees and cabbage palms. I saw a lot of fiddler crabs as well as a raccoon and a variety of birds. Unfortunately Sebastian had to stay in his car as he brought his little puppy which was not allowed to enter the trails to avoid distraction of the natural habitants.
My second host was Karush from India and in his house I felt like in a hostel as there were more people from more than five different nationalities at the time I stayed there. Karush was so nice to pick me up on my way to his house. He surprised me a bit, because I hadn't expected it when I walked along the sidewalk of a main road. But I realized within a few seconds that the waving guy was no stranger. As well as Sebastian, Karush went to hit the gym in the evening. Most people who live in Ft Lauderdale go to the gym in their leisure time as there are not a lot of other activities to do. Ft Lauderdale has a long beach but it has not a really nice city center except from one street with restaurants, bars and shops. Unfortunately I just spent a few hours with Karush in which he prepared a delicious vegetarian dinner and we were hanging out with his roomies and friends.
My third stop was at Marcos' house for one night. He was one of the most positive people I've ever met, always in a good mood, so it was great fun to spend time with him. He gave me a little tour around Downtown Ft Lauderdale and one complete day I spent at the beach. Unluckily it started to rain heavily on my way back when I was waiting for the bus. The bus station didn't have any shelter and the bus got me wet too as it was approaching too fast. To make it even worse I even got wet inside the bus at it was leaking and water was dropping from the top down to the seats. Furthermore the bus ride was disproportionately long for the short distance. I was not impressed at all of the public transport system of Ft Lauderdale as a result.
In the evening I went to a weekly meetup which Marcos is hosting at different restaurants and bars around Ft Lauderdale. This evening it took place at a "The Hub", a combined co-working place and bar that had just opened recently. The atmosphere was fantastic, I met a lot of super friendly Couchsurfers and had a wonderful evening. The furnishings of this place were very creative, the DJ's turntables were placed on a barbecue grill for example.
My fourth hosts were Robert and his husband Daniel from Irapuato, Mexico. Robert was the first person I met in Florida who was also born here. Most people who are living in Southern Florida have moved here within the last decades from other states or from anywhere in the world. Robert and Daniel were also the first nudists I was staying with. When I read their Couchsurfing profile I was sceptical at first and I rather decided to stay with other hosts but in the end I decided to give it a try. We had a lot of meaningful conversations about minimalism, homosexual living habits as well as nudism and we even spent one day together at the famous Haulover Naturist Beach. This beach was once known to be filled with homeless people and drug addicts. Now it has left this past behind and offers both locals and tourists nudism as a new experience. At the beginning I felt a bit uncomfortable to walk around naked in the house as well as on the beach, but you quickly get used to it. Nudism becomes more and more important at certain places and different groups all over the world. Nevertheless you can say that it is mostly popular amongst elderly gay men. At places like Ft Lauderdale big investors have recognized nudism as a trend and establish resorts exclusively for nudists. Major tourism companies offer nudist oriented activities.
Robert took me and another Couchsurfer, Benedek from Hungary, to the Everglades for an airboat tour. The Everglades is a region and ecosystem of tropical wetlands in the southern part of Florida, which is currently found nowhere else on Earth like that. It is not a swamp as many people believe but River of Grass, is a more accurate descriptor of this vast, verdant wetland. The Everglades are a shallow, very wide, and very slow-moving river. Unfortunately the urban population of the metropolitan region of Miami has grown tremendously within the last decades so that approximately 50 % of the original area of the Everglades has been developed as agricultural or urban areas. Nevertheless it is still the 3rd largest National Park of the USA. There are different ways of exploring the Everglades, depending on where you go. On our starting point you can just go for an airboat tour, at other points of entry you have also the opportunity to go cycling or hiking. As the water is very shallow and overgrown all the boats are powered by propellers which move air instead of water. On our half-hour ride we got to see one alligator, in the small wildlife center we saw a few crocodiles. The Everglades is said to be the only place on earth where both alligators and crocodiles co-exist in the same habitat.
After spending almost one week in Ft Lauderdale I moved on southwards to Hollywood where I stayed for a few days with Dave and Leo and their small zoo (dogs + python). They were super welcoming hosts which is why I doubled my originally planned length of stay with them. One evening we went for a walk together at the Hollywood Boardwalk, 3.5 km long pedestrian promenade. We were lucky to see a fantastic full moon rise over the ocean.
One complete day I spent in Miami, taking the Tri-Rail from Hollywood to the Miami airport and starting my exploration tour by foot from there. For a metropolitan area with almost six million people in the Miami region the public transport system is a complete mess though. That's why I ended up walking approximately 20 kilometres this day from neighbourhood to neighbourhood. I started with Little Havana, the pulsating Cuban heart of Miami where Latin American art galleries, bustling restaurants, bars and cafés can be found. Cuban coffee and cigars are widely available. The most important street is Calle Ocho (SW 8th Street). I continued my walk south towards the Vizcaya Museum and Gardens and the Alice Wainright Park. After a few more miles I finally reached Downtown Miami where I had a vegan bowl for lunch and walked along the waterfront of Bayfront Park. The city centre of Miami offers free public transportation with the so-called Metromover which I took for a few minutes to relax my legs. Then I went on walking north again towards Wynwood, one of the trendiest quarters of Miami and famous for its many colorful murals. The converted warehouses of many streets are home to craft beer breweries and fancy art galleries. Getting back to the Tri-Rail station turned out to be a complex undertaking, if you don't want to take a taxi but I finally made it back, walking another few kilometres and taking the Metrorail train.
After two weeks in the gay and nudist scene I can definitely say that these people gave me numerous insights into other lifestyles, or rather (sexual) orientations. A great learning effect for me regarding nudism was that you reduce other people in this environment less to external characteristics or clothing. The vulnerability that comes with the exposure of your complete body creates trust. This makes it quicker to connect with each other, and conversational topics quickly shift from the usual small talk to deeper topics. Furthermore there are certainly reasons like less laundry or maybe a better regulation of the body's own temperature and thereas health issues that are in favor of nudism. Apart from that, however, nobody has been able to convince me to become gay or nudist in the long run. ;-)
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