My full day in Key West was exhausting, dahlings (I did over 20,000 steps), but great fun. I got up, did the morning stuff, had breakfast, and headed out. I was in fact slathered in sunscreen, and wished I’d had a real wide-brimmed sunhat rather than just a baseball cap – it was very bright and sunny. I decided to head north and after doing a weird detour around a little residential neighborhood, ended up at my first stop, the Sails to Rails museum. The poor ancient docent had to wear an old-timey costume, but luckily, it was cool inside. It was mostly about the railway that Henry Flagler, with his partner John D. Rockefeller, built down the Keys, the first time the keys were connected by land. The railway was hot stuff for about 25 years or so, until a huge hurricane destroyed a big part of it.
The museum itself was built into the original railway station.
Walked a little bit around the northern wharves, but headed over towards Mallory Square. I was aiming for the shipwreck museum, but first ran into the Key West Museum of Art & History at the Custom House.
Already, half of my decision was about ‘let’s get out of the sun’, but it was worth it – nice art and history stuff here, including more about Flagler and the railroad, and some stuff about early Hemingway (and paintings by Tennessee Williams).
The shipwreck museum was up a block or so. This was fun (although expensive) and I found out I could have gotten a bundled ticket with the Sails to Rails and the Aquarium. I had hoped it would be actual pictures and models of shipwrecks, but it was mostly stuff that had been brought up from shipwrecks.
“Wrecking” was a real industry, and the Shipwreck Museum had a very high lookout tower, which had been used to spot wrecks, alert the whole town and they’d go claim their salvage rights.
Aquarium next, which was perfectly nice, and not too different from the place I’d been in Marathon.
And then out to Mallory Square, which is the big place where everyone gathers to watch the sunset, but this was midmorning – and no shade.
OK, there’s shade right there in the picture, but that was about it.
There was lots of shopping stuff around there, and I realized I was on the north end of Duval Street (which for some reason in my head was east west, but it wasn’t). So decided to head south. First order of business was to get some sort of frozen drink – I was hot (yes, I’d been drinking water). Found a bar which had all sorts of frozen drinks and was set up to directly sell to people on the sidewalk. They actually only had a couple of options for a virgin slurpee-sort-of-thing, and she actually gave me a sample of what I ended up getting, a blue raspberry/lemon concoction. Just what I needed.
Next target was the lighthouse, and I did get there and see the lighthouse, but after reading the description of the museum, decided it wasn’t worth the price. I’d probably have been in there 10 minutes, tops.
And now down to the famous giant buoy representing the southernmost point in the US. I found it, no problem – just follow the tour busses. You could see it just fine, but there was a two-block line to actually get in front of it and take pictures. So I didn’t worry about the selfie aspect and just took it from the side. There was also a sculpture there.
By this point, I sorta-kinda wanted lunch. I wandered up Duval but then realized I was at the point to split off to go to either the cemetery or the grotto. I ended up going around the walled-off south side of the block with the church and looping back around. The grotto is part of St. Mary’s Star of the Sea (a very beautiful church) and is itself very beautiful. C would have loved it, it reminded me of Europe.
Now I had a conundrum. I really wanted to sit down and have something to eat, but according to Google Maps, I was smack between two clusters of restaurants. Decided to walk east, which would get me in the neighborhood of the cemetery, which would be my last touristy stop. As I walked east, it was clear I was definitely getting out of touristy-land and more into low-rent land, starting seeing strip clubs and such. But lo! I found myself by a welcoming gay community center!
So I walked in and chatted with the two guys running the place and looked around and was very impressed. And “do you have a donation box?” “Oh, yes, thanks!”. That was a nice little find.
They gave me a recommendation for lunch, a Mediterranean place called Oasis. I just had grape leaves and a glass of prosecco, but it was yummy and perfect for the weather (al fresco) and the hunger level.
OK (deep breath). Off to the cemetery. What I would have liked to do is walked the length of it and gone out the other end, but I was reasonably certain that the other end wasn’t actually open and I’d have to walk all the way back. So I just did a short little loop, but it was enough to see what was going on.
Back to Alexander’s and immediately headed for the pool.
The other guests had basically been lounging in the pool (and drinking) all day. I discovered that I’d somehow gotten sunburned just on my right shoulder, not sure how I managed that, but wasn’t too bad. I swam and lounged and hung around until happy hour, when it was time for another excellent cosmo.
My evening plans were to go back to Duval Street, go in a few galleries, probably buy a t-shirt or hat at one of the touristy stores, have a drink at a g*y b*r, and then find dinner. I did most of that – I honestly was in a mood that if I’d found something I really wanted at a gallery, I would have gotten it, but naw. I ended up getting my drink at 22andco. It was totally mobbed, but then almost the entire clientele turned out to be the same party celebrating someone’s trans coming-out (??? it was trans day of visibility) and they all filed into a separate room and it was just me and the bartender and a couple of others. I got a cosmo, and since it was “Manic Monday”, it was half-price. Four dollars! (not bad for that) The bartender was (mostly) male-presenting, with a handlebar moustache (hawt!) but was wearing pearls and a corset as well as ripped jeans. It was quite a look!
Finished my drink, went out, bought a pink Key West baseball cap, then had dinner at La Trattoria. That was a nice meal – I had some pasta dish with Italian sausage, then a cannoli. Odd thing though – I was sitting facing a long table of ladies, all having fun, some sort of night out. They were boisterous, but not annoyingly so. But some older gentleman on the way out stopped to talk to them and although I didn’t get it all, it sounded like he was lecturing them for being too rowdy. That was weird, they totally weren’t. But they processed this and then went back to what they were doing.
Back to the guesthouse and to bed. Vacation almost over.
The Toast Point Page 