Key West

 

We are on the second day of our cruise.  We have learned several things. Staff is from all over the world.  The ship has yet to leave port on time.  Portions in the dining room are larger than expected.  While certainly not the youngest we are certainly in the younger quartile I would guess. 

The boat was docked in Key West by its 7:00 AM scheduled time, but the announcement that we were free to go ashore did not come until 7:20.  We did not have a shore excursion scheduled for this stop which was a change from the original cruise itinerary so it made little difference to us.

We had been to Key West once before and had been totally unimpressed.  We had flown to Miami on New Year’s Eve in preparation for a cruise leaving January 3^rd.  Our arrival at the hotel on that trip had us entering someone else’s room at 1:00 AM getting assigned to a smoking room when we went back to the desk, and spending a sleepless night before hopping in the rental car and driving to Key West on what turned out to be one of the coldest January days in their history.  My memory says it was in the 30’s but a little research suggests that it must have been more like 50 and windy.  Whatever it was, needless to say we were not prepared for this temp so all these circumstances may have led to our negative opinion of Key West.  On the previous trip we got out of the car, walked around freezing for about 5 minutes.  Got a piece of Key Lime pie,  got back in our car, and headed back north to Miami.

Key West at 75 and sunny is much nicer than I remembered it.  I wonder why.  We left the ship after our first breakfast aboard, at about 8:30.  We walked for about five minutes and found something called the Conch train.  Sort of like a hop on hop off bus, but in the form of a little train.  The train was started in 1948 and has grown to several trains and hundreds of thousands of visitors.  We decided to take the hour long tour.  The  tour was nonstop facts and information.  We saw the southernmost point in the US, our picture attempt appropriately blocked by picture taking tourists.  We saw mile marker zero for highway #1 which was blocked by a large and oblivious human who moved from the front to the back of the signpost as we moved past blocking any potential picture from both sides.  You’ll just have to believe me.

The best story from the tour is about the secession of Key West from the US.  They apparently seceded on April 23^rd of 1982.  It was in reaction to an immigration problem which caused the federal government to set up a checkpoint which was causing a major backup (17-19 miles long on the only way into Key West) on highway 1 choking the tourist industry in Key West.  Since nobody listened to the pleas of the mayor he concocted what amounted to a PR campaign.  The stories differ somewhat on exactly how it played out, but with the press present on April 23^rd at a rally in Key West the mayor claimed himself prime minister, announced succession, declared war on the US, crumbled some stale bread on a nearby naval officer, then promptly surrendered and requested billions in war reparations.  They never got any money, but the inspection point disappeared shortly after and things went back to normal.  They still celebrate Independence Day on April 23^rd and have a week of parties.  The airport still flies a blue banner announcing the Conch Republic and there are tourist memorabilia noting the rebellion.  If you want a more complete story look it up.  It's interesting.

We enjoyed the conch train.  After that we went out on our first specific buying quest since starting the cruise.  It is only day two after all.  Apparently, we forgot to put in a tux shirt for the tux we put in.  Wanting to wear the tux for Christmas Eve we had a mission.  Thanks to Timmy Tuxedos we fulfilled our mission.  The shirts were so reasonable we bought two and will be ordering a specialty tux with music painted on by a local artist.  Very successful mission and I will now be able to wear my tux on Christmas Eve.

Walked the harbor walk and returned to the ship in time to beat the all-aboard by about thirty minutes.   We also beat the ship leaving by about four hours.  I think I mentioned that the boat is two for two now on leaving late.  Tomorrow is a sea day so we hope not to have a problem with it tomorrow.