Look, there’s a gun.” This is Simon, my 10-year-old. He spends half his life
convinced he’s Spider-Man, so I don’t pay much attention. Besides, he’s been
in a hallucinatory daze since we arrived in Miami four hours ago. Every
other word has been “wow”, as he spots a limo with a zebra-skin paint job, a
display of 50 types of chewing gum and buildings showing more neon than a
Jedi’s lightsabre catalogue.
It turns out, though, that Simon is right. A black pistol, still inside its
holster, is nuzzling against a flowerbed. And a few yards away, in a hotel
forecourt, a man is being handcuffed by two policemen. We’re in an episode
of Miami Vice, except that there are no cameras.
“Shall I take it to them, dad?” I praise Simon for his public-spiritedness,
but say that he might create a little panic if he approaches the policemen
brandishing a weapon. I go over myself, and mention the gun to the policeman
who’s not busy shoving a suspect into a patrol car. He strolls to the
flowerbed with me and plucks up the holster.
“My partner dropped it,” he says. Nothing to worry about, then.
We’d just begun a 10-day road trip around southern Florida – “we” being
myself, my girlfriend, Elodie, and my two children, Simon and Lesley, 13.
I’d wanted our holiday to be exciting, but hadn’t expected lethal weapons to
provide the entertainment.
A road trip with the kids was always going to be a bit of a risk. They grew up
in central Paris, so they’re not used to car travel. Which is why we chose
southern Florida – it has a million fun things to do, all packed into a
sunny corner of America where you’d be mad to drive more than 100 miles in a
day.
We’d started out even less strenuously, with the 20-minute hop from Miami
airport to the beach. The gals look for signs of silicone in a model who’s
flouncing in the waves for a photographer, while Simon and I knuckle down to
the serious male business of building the perfect sand castle.
Come lunchtime, we slide into a booth at Jerry’s diner, one block away from
the beach. The menu is 3ft tall. There’s more to read than in the new Harry
Potter. It has a kids’ selection, but a diner menu is essentially one big
kids’ menu: you can eat almost everything with your fingers. So it’s jumbo
hot dogs and – French diet oblige – salads all round.
We try not to gawp at the gigantic couple in the booth opposite. His mullet
hairstyle was outlawed by the UN in 1989; she is obviously a member of the
Cleavage Liberation Front. They’re carving steaks that can only be elephant
buttocks. And, yes, I assure the kids, they are just normal American
holidaymakers eating normal American meals.
Next day, we head out into the Everglades. We are no more than two miles into
the grassy swamp when Elodie spots an alligator in the canal that runs
alongside the highway. Everyone is sceptical, until another snout breaks the
surface of the water, then another.
There are huge billboards inviting us to meet the ’gators in person by taking
an airboat tour, and a pleading chorus starts up in the back of the car.
Initially, I preach against these metal monstrosities that shatter the peace
of the national park, but I give in when we see a tour managed by the local
native Americans, the Miccosukee. If the original human residents think
airboats are okay, who am I to quarrel?
As we hurtle across the swamp at 40mph, deafened by the giant propeller engine
behind us, we laugh maniacally, forgetting that if the boat hits an
obstacle, we will be catapulted out to become alligator food.
Surprisingly, we see plenty of wildlife (especially herons taking off to
escape the noise) and, when we get back to base, Simon pronounces the ride
“the coolest thing I’ve ever done”. It may not be ecofriendly, but as a
stopoff on a motorway, it beats a Little Chef.
We’re booked in for five nights on Sanibel Island, on the Gulf of Mexico
coast. The name sounds like a French air freshener, but Sanibel is a
preserved mangrove forest behind an endless white-sand beach. Dolphins
frolic offshore and shell-collectors go home with excess baggage.
Switching to the sedentary life doesn’t mean that our road trip is on hold.
The island is gloriously flat and has an extensive network of cycle tracks.
Hiring a bike – especially a cool American one with bull-horn handlebars –
turns every aspect of the holiday into a treat. Back in Paris, if I asked
the kids whether they wanted to go to the supermarket, you would hear their
groans from the top of the Eiffel Tower. Here, though, it’s any excuse to go
pedalling. And, amid the designer mansions and vintage sports cars, we meet
raccoons, tree frogs and curly-necked egrets.
We get still closer to nature when we hire two-person kayaks and paddle
through the mangroves. Inevitably, we team up along gender lines, and while
we lads splash to victory, it’s Elodie who gets the photos of turtles,
pelicans, giant fish and, yes, an alligator. A meagre consolation for losing
the race, though, surely?
After almost a week on the island, the children aren’t keen to get back in the
car, until we bribe them with a promise of another airboat ride.
We strike lucky. Our first excursion had been a simple dash through the swamp,
but this time our guide intersperses bursts of engine thrust with a
wonderfully ghoulish commentary.
“See those vultures?” he asks (tweak on the throttle). “They’re eating one of
their siblings. It was bitten by an alligator ... ” (quick rev) “ ... maybe
that one coming towards the boat. If he bites you, you won’t die immediately
... ” (vroom) “ ... but his mouth carries four types of lethal bacteria.”
Back on dry land, we congratulate ourselves on escaping from Florida’s native
predators. A little too soon, as it happens.
Throughout the trip, Simon has been fascinated by American police cars, which
are very different from one county to the next.
And he keeps saying he’d love to see inside one. Now he gets his chance.
We’re cruising towards the Atlantic along a wide boulevard when a pickup truck
materialises in front of us. Its driver is already mouthing “Oops” before I
slam into him.
We pull over to the side of the road, and the young driver apologises
profusely. He went through a stop sign, he admits, and, like, really hopes
we’re okay.
No thanks to him, we are okay, and so – apart from a crumpled front wing – is
our car, but I say that we ought to call the police to report the accident.
“Nah, they’ll take, like, two hours,” he says. “I’ll write a note for your
insurance company.”
“Oh, he’s so cute,” Lesley whispers in French. “Yes, and such a prat,” I tell
her, and call 911. Minutes later, a green-and-white sheriff’s car arrives,
roof lights strobing frantically. Out climbs the kind of feisty policewoman
you read about in crime novels. Five feet tall, bulletproof bra, her belt
bristling with weapons, she pops bubble gum as she listens to my account of
the accident.
Simon gazes adoringly into her car. Four pairs of handcuffs are hanging ready
for use, and there’s a pull-out computer, just like in the movies. The back
seat is scarred with two parallel gashes.
“You could go to jail,” the cop is saying. Not to me, fortunately, but to the
other driver, whose licence is out of date, whose vehicle is not taxed and
who is therefore uninsured.
“I’ll die if he goes to jail because of me,” Lesley wails.
And I’d already be throttling him if I hadn’t paid extra for zero-liability
insurance, I’m thinking.
Later, stretched out on Miami Beach after a last tumble into the warm ocean, I
ask the children what they’ve most enjoyed about our Floridian odyssey.
“Hot dogs, limos and huge televisions.” Simon sums up America in a single
breath.
“Do you think that driver is in prison?” asks Lesley. She’s studying the map,
probably looking for the venue of the jailbreak she’s planning. “Hey,” she
accuses, “you didn’t tell us Disney World’s in Florida.” She shrugs. “I
don’t mind, though. America World’s more fun than Disney World.”
Stephen Clarke is the author of Talk to the Snail: Ten Commandments for
Understanding the French. His new novel, Merde Happens, is out on July 2
(both Bantam Press)
Getting there: fly from Gatwick to Miami with Virgin Atlantic (0870 380
2007, www.virgin-atlantic.co.uk),
British Airways (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com)
or American Airlines (0845 778 9789, www.americanairlines.co.uk).
Fares start at about £500 in summer.
Getting around: Hertz (0870 844 8844, www.hertz.co.uk)
has a week’s inclusive car hire from £90. Or try Alamo (0870 400 4562, www.alamo.co.uk)
or Dollar (0808 234 7524, www.dollar.co.uk).
Where to stay: to add to the road-trip spirit, we didn’t reserve rooms
for every night. Outside peak holiday periods, it’s easy to find a decent
hotel in Florida.
In Miami, the laid-back South Beach Hotel (00 1-305 531 3464, www.crestgrouphotels.com/
southbeachhotel.htm) is an elegant art-deco building on a quiet street
one block from the beach. Families can book a room with two double beds
(from about £60) or take two adjoining rooms.
On Sanibel, which is reached via a causeway, the Waterside Inn (239 472 1345, www.watersideinn.net)
has a pool, direct beach access and individual barbecues. Two-bedroom,
two-bathroom apartments start at £116. What to do: although no airboat tour
is really ecofriendly, the guides at Everglades Holiday Park (954 434 8111, www.evergladesholidaypark.
com; one-hour tour £10.50, children £5.50 child) do at least ease the
throttle when they get eye-to-eye with alligators and exotic birds.
Rent kayaks and paddle around the creeks and lakes at Sanibel’s JN “Ding”
Darling National Wildlife Refuge (www.fws.gov/
dingdarling; double kayak £15 for two hours). Sunblock, hat and water
bottle are essential; a cushion ($1 extra) is advisable.
