A Ride Around Key West Island

We were having some down time and relaxing after a bike ride down Duval.  Troy asked for someone to play with.  Joey volunteered.

Troy has been practicing and reading a book on chess.  Joey hasn't played in years.  The battle started.  Cutthroat chess is vicious.   Soon the game was more than a game.  Joey is VERY competitive!  Game after game Joey fought back after making a wrong move.  He surged ahead only to fail to keep an eye on the Queen or Rook.  Joey played 7-8 games in two days.  Each took about an hour!  Troy ended up the champ but Joey was the ping pong champ.

When we moved our car from in front of our house we place the garbage can in place in order to save our spot.  Parking is very tight on the island.  Our neighbor is from NY and has a small baby.  As she was leaving in her car, we moved her garbage can to protect her spot.  The next day we received a thank you.

These beautiful roses were from a workshop she was teaching and she gave them to us! She is renting the next door house for 5 months.  It sounds tempting.  Maybe in a year or two we can stay longer.

The final morning for Troy and Rider's visit we rode the bikes down to Mel Fisher's Museum.

Mel Fisher's museum has rare gold and silver treasures from authentic shipwrecks.  It also tells how his wife broke the World's record for a woman underwater in scuba gear.  She lasted 55 hours or so.

                                                       http://www.melfisher.com/

Then the gang rode back to the Butterfly Museum and Troy had one butterfly land on his elbow.  Almost on cue!  Then Troy treated us to special crepes right before we had to take them to the airport to return to L.A.

 The next day we decided to take a bike ride around the 2 mile wide and 4 mile long island of Key West. We head north up along Alantic Blvd.  It is nice to ride along the Alantic Ocean and see the sights next to the water.  We stopped just before White Street Pier to see the African Cemetery.

Remember you can click on a picture to enlarge it!

There is a lot of history on the island.  We try to find something new each visit. We continue on our ride.  The water is very clean and clear today.  We will go to the beach when we finish our ride.

We ride past the entrance to the Key West airport.  It has a new departure deck since last year. The airport is right by the Alantic Ocean off Roosevelt Blvd on the NE side of Key West.

Here we stop for our water break.  We are looking across the water to to next island up from Key West.  It is called Stock Island.

There are a few house boats in the channel between the two islands.  I wonder how it would be to live on a houseboat?

As we come to the Gulf side of Key West we stop at Garrison Bight to take our second water break.  It is about 6 miles into our ride.  You can see some of the charter fishing boats ready for today's fishing trip.  Someone else's fishing trip,  as it is about $500 for a 1/2 day charter!  I'm going to start playing the lottery or find a rich older lady with a bad ticker and a houseboat.

We start back to the house and it is about an 1 1/2 hour trip so far.  As we pass down a lovely neighborhood, Molly spots a picture for my blog.  So I take one last shot.

Yes, we are parrot-heads in many ways!

It is going on our 3rd week of our winter vacation and Molly & Joey leave around the 20th of December. I'll hang around for a few days and then pack up the bikes for the trip home.  OK, time to stop whining and go to the beach.  The weather is here, wish you were..........