Best Weekend Getaway 1999 | Everglades City/Chokoloskee | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Miami | Miami New Times
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Best Weekend Getaway

Everglades City/Chokoloskee

If you want to kick back in a nature-intensive, Old Florida kind of way, just take Tamiami Trail to within about 30 miles of Naples, then hang a left at State Road 29. Once you cross the bridge into Everglades City, you're on the threshold of the Ten Thousand Islands, a maze of mangrove islets and brackish water between the Everglades and the Gulf of Mexico -- where us city folks get many of our stone crabs. The tiny Twin Cities of southwest Florida have always boasted a curious blend of insularity and bravado, typified by the recently deceased swamp pirate Loren G. "Totch" Brown. Ol' Totch spent most of his life lurking in and around the islands and Everglades National Park, hunting quarry such as "Chokoloskee chicken" (ibis, the killing of which is now illegal) and "square grouper" (bales of marijuana, the trafficking of which landed Totch and many of his neighbors in the pokey some years back). Yet despite the shadiness of his pursuits, Totch wrote a book about his adventures, thus adding to the mystique of his swampy haunts. They're plenty mystical on their own, though. Whether you want to explore the labyrinthine mangroves by canoe, kayak, airboat, flatbottom tour boat, or airplane, Everglades City and Chokoloskee are perfect staging areas. Check with the park rangers at the visitor center (941-695-3311) for boat tours and canoe rentals. The water is jumping with fish, if that's your pleasure. If you just want to gawk at wildlife as you paddle or putter around, you'll see alligators, osprey, pelicans, cormorants, and maybe a dolphin or bald eagle. You can launch your boat from Chokoloskee, and by all means check out the historic Smallwood's Store in the tiny island town, but Everglades City has all of the lodging. There are a couple of charming B&Bs, but why not go whole hog and stay at the famed Rod and Gun Club (941-695-2101). Sure it's a more expensive place to eat and sleep, but hey, presidents have bunked there. You at least need to pop in for a drink and stare at the Barron River as it meanders by the historic, whitewashed inn. Like most eateries in town, it specializes in seafood pulled out of local waters.

Best Movie Shot On Location

There's Something About Mary

People either think this movie is brilliant or pathetic. Whatever. Mary brought Cameron Diaz and Matt Dillon to Miami for quite a spell. Shooting scenes in Coral Gables, Brickell, and various South Beach locales must have rubbed Diaz the right way. She became one of Miami's darlings, hanging out well after the movie wrapped. Dillon also made the most of his time here. He lived at the Hotel Astor, hung at Mac's Club Deuce, and happily mingled with the locals. The movie itself showcased Miami in a more flattering way than any flick in recent memory has.

Second Best New Law

Local campaign finance reform

In December 1998 the Miami-Dade County Commission adopted an ordinance that bans corporations from donating money to commission races. Although it won't end the influence-peddling at county hall, it is a step in the right direction. In the past politically connected individuals could funnel thousands of dollars to their favorite commission candidates by writing $500 checks from each of their companies. Some individuals even created multiple corporations so they could write more checks and buy even more influence with certain commissioners. That loophole is now closed thanks to Commissioner Jimmy Morales's proposal. Companies wishing to do business with the county will now have to find another way to grease their pet pols.

Best Am Radio Personality

Hank Goldberg

His four-hour talk show, weekdays on WQAM from 2:00 to 6:00 p.m., is ostensibly a sports program, but Goldberg's pugnacious punditry stretches far beyond the wide world of sports. One recent Tuesday afternoon, for example, "the Hammer" managed to pound on the following topics: Bagel Cove restaurant ("I was the only one there who didn't have blue hair"); Hialeah racetrack ("What's that skinny disease? Anorexia? An anorexic wouldn't throw up there"); and the War Between the Mayors over the Miami Circle ("Penelas is getting on my nerves again. If you can't see that he's grandstanding ..."). His relentless self-assurance, whether he's touting a 30-1 longshot at Gulfstream, railing against Miccosukee Indian Gaming, or chatting amiably with a Panthers defenseman, makes his an undeniable voice of authority. If you're looking for a truly independent, passionate, old-school chronicler of Miami sports -- and life -- forget the Herald. Trust the Hammer.

Best Mile Of Miami

Biscayne Boulevard

Periodically various sections of vice-infested Biscayne Boulevard emerge as the latest darlings of developers and entrepreneurs. At last, these urban-renewal boosters boast, Biscayne is on the verge of moral rebirth and commercial boom. Speculators buy up chunks of the street. And then somehow it just doesn't quite come together; somehow Biscayne is as resistant to reform as, well, as its crack-addicted hookers. Still the signs of new life on this seamy stretch of the boulevard are encouraging. Key is the renovation from 54th to 57th. High-profile restaurateur Mark Soyka, resident of nearby Morningside and originator of the News Café and the Van Dyke, has just opened a new restaurant and gourmet store at 55th, with several other shops to follow. If Soyka can pull off a planned transformation of the gas station of ill-repute at 54th into a coffee-and-croissant market, that just might clinch the turnaround. On the twenty blocks stretching north, many new restaurants and businesses have begun to move in on the kitschy collection of sleazy motels. Wide-open drug and sex sales appear markedly down, though it's still a bad idea to actually walk along the sidewalks at night. You won't be in much danger, but you will almost surely be mistaken for someone -- old, young, churchgoing, no matter the color or sex or sexual orientation -- who is selling or in the market for something illegal.

Best Lawyer

Kendall Coffey

Miami's own comeback counselor, former U.S. Attorney Kendall Coffey, pulled off the legal achievement of the year when he ousted a sitting mayor. Coffey argued in Miami-Dade Circuit Court that Joe Carollo lost the November 1997 Miami mayoral election owing to rampant fraud among absentee balloting. He was convincing. In March 1998 Judge Thomas Wilson, Jr., booted Xavier Suarez, the putative titleholder. The expulsion survived an appeals court hearing. The episode occupies a special place in the tropical hothouse of Miami politics, and not just because of the dead man who voted or the arrest of a campaign worker for buying absentee ballots. This was significant because it also signaled Coffey's return to the limelight. In 1996 the federal prosecutor resigned his post after he was accused of biting a dancer in a strip club. To his credit though, the chagrined Coffey didn't flee town. He stuck around, rightly believing that our collective memory would evaporate like a puddle after a summer shower. Then new opportunities blossomed. It was worth the wait for him. What's getting caught taking a little love bite compared to toppling a corrupt government?

Best Supporting Player

Kim Ostrenko

Sam Shepard's characters are many things: schemers, losers, maligned heroes. But they're rarely female. When women are present, as in the case of Cecilia, a would-be love interest of the protagonist in Shepard's 1994 play Simpatico (produced this past summer by the Florida Shakespeare Theatre, now called GableStage), they're odd ducks, intruders in a strange male universe. Sometimes they get lost amid all the testosterone. That wasn't the case with cast member Kim Ostrenko. The actress may have been playing one of the oddest creatures in the Shepard menagerie, but she deftly embodied all of Cecilia's contradictions, moving from utter blankness to incisive maneuvering in the blink of an eye. She may not have been a star in this play, but Ostrenko's performance was indubitably a star turn.

Best Design

David K. Sherman

Any stage designer can put his or her imprint on a show that no one's seen before. But what do you do when you've got to dress up the longest-running musical on or off Broadway? That would be The Fantasticks. The Hollywood Playhouse staged the chestnut as the debut performance under its new management, and nobody who's seen the off-Broadway version could recognize the set. A boy, a girl, and a wall were the basic elements, as they have been for 40 years, but in place of a bare stage and black-box aesthetics, designer David K. Sherman substituted cotton-candy pastels and whimsical costumes. Think the show can't work with an entire palette of cheerful light filters that changed the performance area from pink to blue to midday yellow? Think again. As this production demonstrated, just because a show is timeless doesn't mean it has to be stale.

Best Short-Lived Miami Showcase

Sins of the City

Not since Miami Vice has a television show better harnessed the color and character of Miami. Each Saturday night Sins of the City reveled in the rainbow hues of the I.M. Pei's CenTrust Tower and the quaint mansions of Morningside, along with the obligatory Deco decadence of South Beach. The weekly series debuted this past July to scathing reviews, all well deserved: The plots were almost inconceivably stupid and the acting provoked dry heaves among those hearty enough to watch. (Lead "Sinner" Marcus Graham always seemed disarmingly constipated.) Nine shows later, in October, Sins slipped off the air, seemingly forever. For entertainment-seeking cable viewers, that's probably a good thing. But for the beautiful character actor that is Miami, it's a good thing gone.

Best New Law

Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act

Congress passed this law in October 1998 after an unprecedented bipartisan, multiethnic lobbying campaign conceived in Miami-Dade County. The measure grants green cards to about 50,000 Haitian immigrants living in the United States before 1996. These immigrants, concentrated in South Florida and New York, would otherwise be awaiting deportation today . Congress approved the measure a year after passing a similar bill benefiting Cubans, Nicaraguans, Guatemalans, and Hondurans -- but excluding Haitians. The effort to push the Haitian act through Congress involved players as diverse as Republicans Gov. Jeb Bush, U.S. Sen. Connie Mack, U.S. Reps. Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen; and Democratic lawmakers Sen. Bob Graham and Rep. Carrie Meek. Behind-the-scenes alliances were equally important and featured powerful lobbyists from both parties, plus leading immigrants' advocates, and a host of Haitian community leaders and activists from all over the country. Perhaps most significantly, it was the first time Miami's Haitian leaders stepped outside Little Haiti to wield influence in national politics.

Best Of Miami®

Best Of Miami®

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