Tomorrow morning I set off on a usual get away to Ft. Lauderdale FL. I go there often, sometimes with my better half and sometimes without. This is a without trip. I enjoy time alone, traveling with myself. While it’s nice to travel together, we both enjoy alone time as well. I feel it’s good for me to go, read, reflect, get my own meals, walk, sleep meet new people and just do what I need for me.
I have been traveling to Ft. Lauderdale off and on since 1984. Back then I was young and did the bar scene. Those were the days of the Marlin Beach Hotel which was an old 1950s mid century motel ocean front in the middle of the main strip of Ft. Lauderdale beach.
It was an all gay hotel that eventually gave way to development and is now a high rise Marriott timeshare resort called Beach Place. I went to my first T-Dance in 1984 at the Marlin Beach. I have been told that T-Dance was invented at the Marlin Beach in 1964. According to this legend the hotel had fallen on bad times and rented out the bar on Sunday afternoons to a gay man. He threw parties every Sunday afternoon calling them T-dance. Apparently he became very successful and eventually made enough money to buy the hotel and turned it into a gay resort. The Marlin Beach saw it’s heyday as a gay resort in the 1970s & 1980s. I have never checked these facts but the place holds many fond memories for me.
Today Ft. Lauderdale is a very popular gay destination. I live driving distance to Palm Springs but much prefer Ft. Lauderdale (it has an ocean…that is warm). I have a favorite resort just two blocks off the beach and am there so often the staff knows me quite well and even knows what room I want when I call for a reservation. It’s a clothing optional men’s resort that has 3 pools, two spas, a gym and about 63 rooms. It’s classic Ft. Lauderdale mid-century in design, has lush tropical gardens and is very well kept. The owner and staff are incredible hosts. if you ever plan a trip there I highly recommend it, The Worthington/Alcazar/Villa Venice Resort.
So time with myself will be my journey the next few days. I will see some friends I have there and make new ones. I will work out, walk, swim, relax, meditate and contemplate. I will grow. Fearsome will also grow a little and will see his friends Shannon and Cole at American Made Barber Shop for a little maintenance. One must trim the tree of its weak branches to help it grow stronger. One must also trim the self of stress and weaknesses to grow stronger. May Fearsome and I trim, grow and become stronger.
A postcard picture of The Jules Verne Room at The Marlin Beach Hotel circa 1960. This room later became the disco. It had windows into the pool which was apparently not uncommon in the hotels of the time there. Another pool like this can be seen in the movie Where The Boys Are which takes place in Ft. Lauderdale also about 1960. Today this is replicated in the new W Hotel on Ft. Lauderdale beach where you can actually walk up a glass enclosed staircase from the main bar through the pool to the pool deck. When I was dancing in the Jules Verne Room Disco in 1984 (then renamed The Poop Deck) men would often dive into the pool and show their goods to the patrons in the bar.
Fearsome Beard 