Restless Explorer

On our way home from The Bahamas we had a short stay in Fort Lauderdale for one night before flying home.  It was the last day/night of our vacation and wanted to finish it right.  After reading reviews and comparing prices, we booked The Westin Beach Resort, right on Fort Lauderdale Beach Blvd.  I used my hotels.com free night, accumulated from 10 nights stayed prior, and reduced the price of our hotel by about $110.  We still paid close to $200 after taxes, but for a beautiful hotel right on the beach in Fort Lauderdale, a total price tag of $300 was expected.  Hotels.com is one of my favorite sites to use because every 10 stays, you get a night free, there are also member discounts on several hotels each time you are booking.  The free night is the average price of your 10 prior stays, and the night we earned was cheap because we stayed in some cheap hotels in the Philippines earlier in the year.  But that doesn’t matter because if you book a more expensive hotel, you just pay the difference.

The “Free Vacation”

When I was younger and on a family vacation in Miami one of the highlights was a speedboat your of the Biscayne Bay and the Miami Skyline.  Fast forward 20 years, and I now have my own family; we wanted to do something similar but a bit more baby friendly. 

When I was in Florida as a teenager, I remember the food being good and a wide variety of choices.  But when I came back this summer, the food was even better and more diverse than I remembered.  Well, when I say diverse, there was a lot more than typical American food.  Being a fan of Latin America, the wide range of Latin foods was one of my favorite things from our 4 nights in Miami/Fort Lauderdale.  We stayed in South Beach, so that is where we ate in Miami, but we also had one night in Fort Lauderdale on our return back from the Bahamas, and the food was tremendous in both cities. 

Miami is a beautiful city and is most famous for Ocean Drive and the South Beach neighborhood.  I knew when we booked a few nights in Miami we had to stay in South Beach, but was concerned about the price.  After doing some research, and finding out where I could use my remaining Aeroplan points that I had acquired a long time ago, I booked with the Berkley Shore Hotel.  I was able to get two nights with all of my Aeroplan points which worked out to being about $220 a night… not bad for Miami and especially for South Beach.

I have previously written blogs for flying with a baby and for taking a road trip with a baby (click the links to read them), but this post is different.  These tips will focus on being out and about for long periods of time while sightseeing and partaking in touristy things, along with staying in the hotel for an extended period with the baby.

Everyone who has heard of the Bahamas knows about the crystal blue waters and white sand beaches. Most people know about swimming with/feeding the pigs while island hopping and Atlantis Resort on Paradise Island. These things are all wonderful and I've talked about them in my other blog posts, but here are things to do while exploring downtown Nassau for a day or two, and are good options while stopping over on a cruise.

Two years ago, on August 11th, 2022 we got engaged in Puerto Rico which is a beautiful Caribbean island.  Originally, our plan was to get married in Mexico for a destination wedding.  But then last year we had our baby girl and it was going to be too hard to coordinate a destination wedding with everyone and work around our babies schedule, so instead we decided to secretly get eloped in the Bahamas.  We booked our trip and began looking for elopement packages.  We came across “Weddings in the Bahamas” with Anne Marie as the planner which looked like a good option.

Paradise Island is an island just off the coast of Nassau and it truly is paradise.  It is a home to the famous Atlantis Resort which has a number of luxury hotels and attractions.  Atlantis is like a Vegas vacation for families in the Caribbean.  It is expensive to stay there and the cheapest we found a night was close to $600.  We couldn’t afford to stay there but decided to see what it was all about and purchased a day pass which cost us $195 USD, and the baby was free.  We headed out early and got there for 9 am to try and get the most of our money. 

The Bahamas is known for its pristine beaches and cruise ships.  We went to Nassau, which has beautiful beaches, but it has the “worst” beaches in all of the Bahamas.  Exuma, Harbour Island and Eleuthera are home to some of the Bahamas best beaches but those islands were too far away and would be very pricey to get there from Nassau all for a days trip.  Instead, we opted for island hoping around Nassau.  After browsing online for a couple of weeks, I came across a 3 island, 4 stop tour on a speed boat booked through Get your Guide.  The tour is actually run by Shore 2 Shore and was reasonably priced compared to some of the other island tours in the Bahamas. 

Everyone has heard of the Bahamas, and everyone knows that the country is home to endless pristine beaches and a large cruise port.  Aside from that there is the world renowned Atlantis resort, pig beach and pink sand beach which some others may know of.  For the history buffs there is a ton of pirate history as the island was home to a number of the most renowned pirates  and was known as the “Pirate Republic.”  Some of those things many people will have known, but not everyone.  There were also a few other interesting facts I learned during our 5 days stay on the island.

When most people think of beach holidays in the Caribbean and other similar locations they think of relaxing at an all-inclusive resort.  And when most people think of the Bahamas they think of pristine beaches.  Unfortunately, the Bahamas doesn’t offer many all-inclusive resorts other than a handful.  Even the famous Atlantis isn’t all inclusive, and the cheaper options on Paradise Island will run you about $600 a night (not all inclusive).  When browsing for hotels for our stay in the Bahamas we came across Sandyport Beach Resort.  Then we stumbled across their Instagram page; the resort, the beach and photos looked phenomenal.  We wouldn’t have the luxuries of Atlantis, and like Atlantis Sandyport isn’t all inclusive but the resort had good reviews and was just over $300 CAD a night with taxes and fees.  For the Bahamas that is pretty much a steal.