Yes, Key West! We rented a car in Fort Lauderdale and drove five hours down to Key West (weekend traffic). Sue nor I have ever been and this was a great opportunity because things were really quiet around the marina over the weekend. Sue lined up a bed and breakfast on the internet, which turned out to be quite nice and located on Duval Street, which is right in the heart of old town. We parked the car and walked everywhere. We visited Hemingway's home, the Truman summer White House, had the obligatory Margarita at Jimmy Buffet's bar, watched a beautiful sunset from Mallory Square at the southernmost point in the U.S. while excellent street performers and musicians provided entertainment, did the 'Duval Crawl', took pictures at U.S Route One's Mile 0 and 'people watched' all over town. There were crowds of people everywhere but we did not see many of the 'gays' that KW is supposed to be famous for. Overnight Saturday night a Carnival Cruise Lines ship docked in KW and poured even more people into town. The place was hopping day and night. There was a first class Artists Festival going on over the weekend with artisans from all over Florida. I would rate it as one of the best festivals I have ever seen. I climbed the 88 steps to the top of the KW lighthouse (my Cardiologist would be proud) while Sue attended the fair! The view from lighthouse was sensational. When I finally caught up with Sue she had already picked out a 'trinket' for the boat ;-)
We truly enjoyed our visit to Key West and do not regret going through the Okeechobee Waterway instead of taking our boat to the FL Keys. Most cruising people go to Marathon, which is fifty miles north of KW in the FL Keys. The cost and unavailability of moorings and/or docking in Key West plus the sea conditions between keep most cruisers away. By driving down to KW we bypassed those issues. As a matter of interest, years ago water from Lake Okeechobee was piped all the way to Key West. There is some very interesting history in this area especially due to it's close proximity to Cuba. Havana is only 90 miles from Key West.
If you have never been to Key West I highly recommend that you add a visit to your 'bucket list'.
Y'all stay vertical,
Capt John and First Mate Sue
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