Miami 2021: Diary – Day 10

The alarm went off early at 3:30. It was a bit of a struggle, but we all got up and got ready quickly. It helped that we had everything packed and ready the night before.

Checkout

We made our way down to the lobby to formally check out. Even though this was a stay on points, we had to pay the resort fee, room taxes, and the what we charged to the room. I also made sure to see if we could split the bill across two credit cards.

My wife and I both have the Marriott Brilliant credit card which has a $300 credit every member year for spend at Marriott properties. I hadn’t used the one on my card yet so I hoped we could put exactly $300 of the bill on my card and the rest on my wife’s. The agent was able to do that with no issue so that eased the pain for the final bill of a very disappointing stay.

Lyft Mixup

With the the bill settled we went to wait for the scheduled Lyft to arrive. It showed up 10 minutes after the requested time (still within the declared window), but the ride was definitely NOT a LyftXL which holds 5 passengers (plus the driver). It was a regular 5 person SUV which technically only holds 3 passengers due to COVID restrictions.

It wasn’t clear whether the driver was misrepresenting their vehicle or if Lyft messed up and sent us the wrong car, but we confirmed in the app that we had ordered a LyftXL.

The ride to the airport was quite cramped, but we made it. We were in no position to cancel and re-order another ride since there were so few drivers available at that time of the day.

Flight Home

The Fort Lauderdale airport experience was pretty smooth. We checked our bags and made it through security with no issues except my youngest getting flagged for a water bottle in his backpack. It wasn’t his fault this time, though. I had put it in there when we had switched hotels. Since the bottle was small, he had missed it when checking it the night before.

We got into the terminal and found that it was too early for any of the food options to be open yet so we wouldn’t be able to get breakfast until we landed in Boston. Good thing we had some snacks packed.

Back in Boston there was a fresh coat of snow on the ground from a few days prior. We already missed the warmth of southern Florida!