Fort Lawtherdale

The 2019 Bachelorette's are off to a hot start with #FortLawtherdale fresh in the books! Kudos to the bride for coming up with this hashtag, I started to forget we were actually going to Fort Lauderdale, it's become a natural part of my vocabulary. We couldn't think of a better way to celebrate Carissa then to merge her love of country music with the land of sunshine and all of the sand at Tortuga Music Festival!

Theme:

We stuck to the Tortuga vibes pretty hard, so all things beach-y with a touch of country. Our trusty cactus floatie once again made its way into my carry-on, the AirBnB was complete with Cheers Beaches decor and of course we had matching bandanas to rock at Tortuga!

We had matching Fort Lawtherdale fanny packs created which were an absolute lifesaver. Whichever fashion icon decided it was time for the fanny to come back, thank you! A fanny pack not only has the space to keep all of your festival essentials (sunscreen, phone + portable charger, sunglasses, hand sanitizer, wallet) but keeps your hands free to be able to carry a beer (in both hands) or dance all night without the worry of a purse.

The bride also prescribed us hangover kits complete with Flawless By Friday under eye masks (still a necessity 5 days later!) and her personal fav Kick Sticks (which we were introduced to at Snowbombing this time last year!). The last piece of our Bachelorette Kits were customized tumblers that one of the other girls had created and were perfect by the pool and on our Sunday Funday boat cruise!

Where To Stay:

Fort Lauderdale has endless options of hotels and AirBnB's. There are some absolutely beautiful hotels and mansions of houses right on the beach, however knowing we were spending the bulk of our time not at home, we opted to choose a slightly less expensive option (that still had our mandatory pool) about 7km from the beach in Wilton Manors. Definitely not a 'party' area but a short uber away. The best part of our place (besides the pool) was the feature floral wall in the backyard (ie. our instagram backdrop).

If I were to do it again, I would probably try to get a little bit closer to the beach. Courtyard by Marriott FL Beach, The Westin FL Beach, Bahia Mar FL Beach, The W FL are all great options right along the main beach strip.

What To Do:

The whole purpose of our group choosing Fort Lauderdale for Carissa’s Bachelorette was centered around her love for country music and hot weather which made Tortuga the obvious choice, so naturally our trip was centered around Tortuga Music Festival.

Tortuga Music Festival: Country Music festival on the beach … could you create a better match! Taking place early April each year, it is a must attend for any country music fan. This year was headlined by Jason Aldean, Thomas Rhett and Kenny Chesney with other acts including Maren Morris, Midland, Kane Brown, Sheryl Crow and many more.

I've done a lot of music festivals (probably too many), but this was the first that actually took place on a beach. I like to think the work out we got from standing on walking on sand for hours and kms on end made up for the amount of drinks consumed ... but it's a toss up. Seriously, I just about collapsed out of bed after the first night adjusting to the sand!

The team at Tortuga does a great job with all the on-site ambience from the fun signs posted up all around to the branded activations, I was impressed. Coralling a group our size to get on site early is something none of us could manage and partly because the stages are so far apart and like I said before, walking in sand is no easy feat, so we weren't able to see all of the artists we would have liked to... but I wouldn't change any of our day activities, planned or unplanned and the artists we did see were amazing! My only complaint would be the drink lines up by the front of the stage. I think we started getting 4 at a time just to limit the number of times you'd have to wait in line (and maybe the $13 price tag/drink). All in all, I'd go back in a heartbeat #tortugafest 2020?

Breezy Tiki Party Boat: Spending a day on the water with all of your favourite people is always one of our favourite activities so when I came across the Breezy Tiki Party Boat, a pontoon style BYOB boat, I knew it would be the perfect addition to our weekend. One of the surprises we had for our bride was that her Mom was actually surprising her in Florida and we planned to execute the surprise on The Breezy Tiki! It was touch and go for a bit considering we were all on the same small flight Friday morning, but luckily we were able to keep her Mom hidden and had her pop out as we boarded!

If you plan on checking out the Breezy Tiki, I highly recommend making Fanny (the Flamingo) apart of your afternoon, because the only thing better than hanging out on a boat all day is hanging out on a giant pink flamingo named Fanny! A huge thank you to Shannon and the crew at Breezy Tiki for making our Sunday afternoon absolutely perfect!

There is a lot of other options out there if you’re heading down when Tortuga isn’t on or if you simply want to change it up for a day or two. Wet at The W Hotel has Vegas-style pool parties and there are so many bars right along the beach you can do a water taxi pub crawl. Miami is only a couple hours away so you could do a day (or night) trip to Miami. Or if you'd rather take it easy, pack a picnic and cooler and spend the day on the beach! There is definitely no shortage of fun to be had in Fort Lauderdale.

Where To Eat & Drink:

I'm not going to lie, a lot of our drinking was centred around the Festival and our eating was forgetting to eat at the Festival so finding whatever restaurant on the strip would feed 15-20 people at 11pm, so by no means is this an exhaustive list, but hopefully a start.

Louie Bossi: Hands down you MUST go to Louie Bossi for brunch if you are in Fort Lauderdale. It is the cutest, most pinterest worthy restaurant I think I've ever seen, like a little backyard oasis! Plus they have bottomless mimosa, Bloody Mary's and Aperol Spritz's, which is the only way to brunch... not to mention the food was incredible! I booked 2 months in advance and could still only get a 10:30am reso (which shows how popular this place is!), but I am so happy we got our butt's out of bed and made it here because it was worth it!

Rocco's Tacos: A Fort Lauderdale staple and our Monday afternoon Happy Hour destination. $5 margaritas and $2 tacos plus another beautifully decorated restaurant and a very happy group of gals! The one thing to note here is if you want to celebrate Happy Hour (which, why wouldn't you) you need to order from the bar.

Tsukuro: Bless our server at Tsukuro because she was an absolute gem. A Japanese Fusion restaurant that 'seated' 19 of us at 10:30pm for dinner and 2 for 1 margaritas. I say seated loosely considering it was very little time before almost all 19 of us were up on the chairs and then up on top of the table dancing the night away! I can only imagine what the other patrons were thinking but we had a time and a half. Not to mention how amazing the sushi and lobster mac and cheese was as a late night treat.

Rosie's Bar and Grill in Wilton Manors was a great place to kill time until our AirBnB was ready and to get the party started (seriously Happy Hour in the States is the best!). YOLO was our one formal dinner on Monday night which might have been a little bit too formal after a Rocco Taco's Happy Hour. Booze Garden is a bar with backyard games and American Social is a good sports bar with craft beer. Elbo Room is also the 'must go' club right on Las Olas, only we never fully made it there! Another spot that looked really cute from the outside was El Camino, right on Las Olas Blvd, and would definitely check it out next time.

Budget $1500-$1800 (approx. CAD):

Note that this budget was based on attending Tortuga Music Festival so we were on the higher end of the spectrum If you are going to Fort Lauderdale on any old weekend a $1500 budget is definitely achievable.

Flight (from Toronto): $267

AirBnB: $300 (each)

Tortuga 3 day Festival Pass: $315

Breezy Tiki Boat: $70 (each)

Drinks: $400

Meals: $250

Ubers: $70

Bach Supplies: $50

Misc: $50

All in all, I like to think another successful Bachelorette weekend. Not only was it a great 4 days with some of our best friends celebrating our favourite bride, but we also met some pretty fun people along the way! Exactly two weeks until the big day and I could not be more excited to celebrate one more time.

Cheers to this bride!

xx

Nicole