We left a very wet New York to fly into a hot and muggy Miami under a hurricane warning. Good bye to wonderful Pilates learning experiences and to the little tight box we’d lived in for the last week and hello to the wide open spaces of Miami. What struck me immediately was the width and consistent layout of the streets, and then the expanse of the development all the way along the coast.
We arrived late in the afternoon to a lobby that gleamed with marble and with grandeur of another time. The staff seemed helpful, and when I opened the door to my room it seemed to be a palace when compared with my New York digs. Sally and I had adjoining rooms, until she was continually locked out and the handle fell off my door that connected us both. This seemed to become the beginning of a number of similar happenings that continued throughout our stay.
After a quick tour to gain the lay of the land we settled in to our rooms – with a chardy that we bought from the bar. Almost as soon as we’d relaxed, breathed and taken off our shoes an evacuation message came over the loudspeakers. We dutifully threw our shoes back on whilst quickly finishing our wine and scurried down the 16 flights of stairs, glancing around for sight of another person. We saw none. On arrival at the lobby we discovered that earlier in the afternoon a message was announced that there would be an evacuation notice to ignore…sadly we’d not arrived in time to hear it. So, happy that we’d had a late night burst of cardio, we both slept well to wake and find ourselves in the morning out by the pool in the sweatbox they called a gym.
The Thursday we spent in South Miami Beach on Lincoln Rd – where a famous outdoor shopping mall is located. Loud people, colours, lots of sequins and diamantes were on display, and I was dismayed to see that prices of clothes etc were quite expensive. We did some Pilates studio scouting and then back at the hotel we did some matwork as the hurricane warnings heralded the arrival of massive storms that continued over the next 24hrs.
On the Friday I chose to experience some Miami group Reformer classes that were in varied locations from South to North Beach. The classes were small but very fitness oriented in composition and delivery. I could see (and experienced) the wide chasm of Pilates in the US where one extreme is designed to tone in a group setting without a thorough understanding of foundation Pilates principles, and the other end offers clinical work where clients receive very modified Pilates that does not progress to the Pilates repertoire or full body workout potential that we know as Pilates. The PMA registered studios sit somewhere in the middle of these extremes. That evening, back at the hotel during a cocktail hour, we began to meet other participants of the summit including Elizabeth Anderson, Deborah Lessen, Anne McMillan, Mark Trudeau, Jennifer and Matthew Zumann, Shelly Power and Sheri Betz to name a few.
The Summit started proper on the Saturday and wound up Sunday midday, and was very draining despite the fact that we sat down throughout. It was very interesting to view the processes from an outsiders perspective and also to note the discussion and personalities throughout. Please read a full round up of the Summit in this months PAA newsletter. Outside the Summits hours, Sally Anderson and myself threw ourselves into matwork, some cardio at the gym, swimming in the Atlantic Ocean and a bit of sightseeing. The Miami beach area I would describe as being like the Gold Coast on steroids; it is completely built as a resort area where spas proliferate, there is an over abundance of restaurants, cafes, night clubs and bars, and prices for everything are slightly higher than elsewhere in the US.
By Monday, we were delighted to pack our bags and to head home to Australia. During my adventure day on the Friday before, in between Reformer classes I’d arranged to get my mobile fixed at the Apple store (remember that I’d managed to put it through the wash at the Laundromat in New York). In the end I purchased a replacement handset. On Monday, I managed to leave it in the Admirals Lounge at the Miami airport. Sure enough, when Sally (who was travelling home on a much later flight) entered the lounge, they questioned her about the phone as her name had appeared as the most recently contacted number. Luckily at the New York airport I was contacted by the Miami lounge whilst in the New York equivalent waiting for my connecting flight to Australia and was subsequently notified that they’d send the mobile back to Australia with Sally. Phew! Moral of the story: obviously I don’t like and should not possess mobile phones….
Lanette Gavran
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