Miami and Key West

You’ve seen Miami so often in countless films and tv series that when you visit it for the first time, it’s like bumping into a famous person who looks so familiar that you are convinced you actually know them. But if Miami were a celebrity, she would toss her immaculately groomed hair, give you a glacial look and stalk off in her six-inch-high designer heels.

It’s an exciting, sexy city with wonderful architecture – both old and new – but beneath the surface dazzle, it has a slightly hard edge. My family of four had wanted to stay in South Beach but found it booked up.

When I said this to an old gay friend of mine, who lives in ritzy Palm Beach up the coast, he was amazed: “But why on earth would you want to stay in South Beach if you’re not going clubbing and getting laid?”

 So we stayed in Coconut Grove and travelled into town to explore the culture and the pizzazz. Our first visit was to the Arsht Center, designed by Cesar Pelli, which is something of a space-age looking landmark in its otherwise undistinguished downtown setting. We went to hear a handsome singer Cheyenne Jackson – later to appear in Glee – do a few numbers in a new restaurant in the arts complex, Prelude by Barton G. Barton G Weiss, who has a bit of a Donald Trump thing going on, appears to be a Miami mover and shaker, with a number of buzzy restaurants to his name, as well as transforming the late Gianni Versace’s mansion into an extremely expensive boutique hotel.

On our way to the Versace hotel we passed giant sculptures along the waterfront: Botaros and massive bright pink snails. The Hotel Viceroy has gargantuan African faces used as struts to support the first floor; another building had strikingly decorative totem poles in grey and rust stripes as low-level columns.

Outside Versace’s house, there was a swarm of tourists. On the architectural walking tour we went on the following day – which is not to be missed — our terrifically informative guide, Jack Johnson from the Miami Design Preservation League, told us that this is the second most visited building in the States after the White House. Well, it is every bit as totally over-the-top as you might imagine it to be. Barton G’s philosophy seems to have chimed in with the previous owner’s: “More is more”. There are hints of Ancient Rome, Istanbul and Morocco. Mermaids, Neptune, coral branches, strands of pearls are abounding motifs. Glorious, colourful, luxurious but not for minimalists.

They will surely enjoy the Frank Gehry-designed New World Center concert hall which opened in January. On the outside it looks a bit like a white box with a flourish of a white sail-like shape to one side. But inside, it is a dream of imaginative, tantalisingly democratic design. The whole philosophy seems to be about transparency; there are many circular, slightly Esher-like staircases, where you can see the musicians walking to the performing space. This has 756 retractable sea-coloured seats which are good-looking as well as comfortable. There are three different stages, one of which is extremely high up. The lobby floors are polished concrete; the walls are made of white plaster.

From the roof terrace, we looked down to the city-owned park, designed by the Dutch landscape artist Adriaan Geuze, where the sound from the concert hall is carried in pipes covered in foliage and crowds can see the concerts which are projected onto a giant white wall. The New World Symphony, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, has a wonderful programme of supporting talented graduates from conservatories around the world, in learning how to develop their craft in symphony orchestras and ensembles.

As an antidote to Miami glitz, we drove 150 miles down the US Highway 1, also known as The Highway that goes to the Sea, to folksy Key West. The drive itself is magnificent as the road narrows over 42 bridges which connect 27 islands, with emerald water on either side and rows of storks sunning themselves. Our hotel was a high point of our stay: the Marquesa, only a block or so away from the hubbub of the main drag of the Old Town, Duvall Street, but a lovely, tranquil spot. We had rooms overlooking one of the two small swimming pools, surrounded by foliage and flowers, and it was so very pleasant dipping in and out of the water that it was hard to venture beyond our civilized confines.

We did try a number of the tourist offerings – the trolley ride through town; Hemingway’s cat-infested house (not much cop despite the best attempts of our guide who had a stance like a gun-slinger and a saloon-bar drawl) and the boys were over the moon about jet-skiing into the tangerine sunset. We all loved breakfast at the Blue Heaven Cafe in Bahama Village where Hemingway used to referee boxing matches. This is a really unusual, funkily ramshackle place – a table tennis table at the back (which the boys made full use of), dirt floor, chickens pecking around your feet, woodwork painted pale blue, yellow and green, wildflowers in glasses on your table, shade from the Spanish lime trees… and everything we ate was fresh and delicious.

Music was provided on a tiny stage, a bare-breasted ship’s figure-head gazing down at the performers who were a couple of kids – a small boy playing bass with his (not much) older sister singing songs by Carole King and the Cranberries, with occasional harmonies provided by their dreadlocked father. They were joined by some members of a touring musical family, the Doerfels – nine brothers to one sister, all with varying degrees of brilliant red hair, who were like a boho version of the Von Trapps.

That night we went to see the full complement of Doerfels at Sloppy Joe’s, a saloon bar on the corner of Greene and Duval streets, dating back to 1937 which was apparently Hemingway’s favourite drinking hole. There are old photos on the walls of Earnest with a prize marlin and bad paintings of ‘Papa’ with his boat, Pilar. This was where he chose to conduct his interviews with Martha Gelhorn and where their affair blossomed which led to him leaving his wife and his subsequent marriage to the journalist. The band rocked, with their progressive bluegrass music on banjo, fiddles, mandolin and double-bass.

The Times