Night Time

Just because the lockdown is over doesn't mean I can't enjoy empty streets in the early hours. With Rusty.

Not necessarily alone but the occasional bicycle at five in the morning will catch me by surprise as I follow Rusty down the sidewalk.

In the overhead illumination I saw an underwater scene by Rick Worth made real on the wall of the Waterfront Brewery:

Buddy Owen's Fish Wagon known as BO's for short, has lived a lifetime on Caroline, a shack of a place, by now a symbol of the gritty Key West sought by visitors seeking authenticity in a  conformist world.

I amuse myself by observing punctuation in signs, especially when they don't have any. Fresh fish: please wear a mask. I guess humans appear  to be exempt?

I read about the great mask debate in other places but the city of key West has required masks inside businesses and social distancing outside. If you don't agree please don't visit. It's a community standard adopted by the city and  majority of residents for everyone's benefit.

The Facebook epidemiologists promoting masks as tools of oppression are the epitome of the need to be cruel that permeates social media. I have given up using Facebook except for family connections and to check the state of the Highway with the handy Sheriff alerts. I like the calm rational approach to life's little problems and the Internet disagrees with my approach.

I have to say there are days when I look back at the road block with enormous ostalgia. The Sheriff tooka  strong stance and proved that the lockdown worked to keep the virus out but that period also saw police incidents drop to near zero. Now that the city has reopened not only are we catching up on abandoned cars and long standing parking violations but drinking, passing out in public, arguments and drunk driving and crashing are all back as though nothing happened.

As crimes go they aren't the sort of brutish nasty violence or cruelty seen in big cities and large populations but on the nuisance level we are firmly headed back to the bad old days of inconsiderate bad neighbors and thoughtless drivers messing things up a bit. I have to say it was expected but the reality is a disappointing reminder of how little we learn in periods of reflection. From a serene low key commute I have seen some hair raising driving as visitors attempt to break all records getting to and from the fabled city of their vacation dreams. And I should note I am not a slow driver as my wife will attest through her own irritation. Yellow lines and dangerous passing zones tell me one thing and tell the day trippers they are a challenge to be overcome. The other morning a white truck was being winched out of the mangroves along a straight clear stretch of highway. How it ended up down there rolled over I cannot for the life of me imagine.

Rusty is a reminder that good things persist through it all, as he waits patiently for me to stop mumbling and fiddling with my apparatus.

Caroline Street

Caroline Street is  getting a long overdue makeover. It's complicated for the businesses in the corridor but this street really does need to be improved because the surface is horrible.

Caroline Street is one block set back from the Key West Bight and it's here you have to pass if you want easy access to the Schooner Western Union and the docks, the Cuban Coffee Queen, Half Shell Turtle Kraals or the new Waterfront Brewery. In it's way it is an important artery and its been worn down to a series of potholes, jagged kerbs and rotten asphalt. You can be bounced out of a scooter seat on some of these holes if you don't notice them in time.

The street is also subject to frequent flooding so the storm drains will get a clean up I'm sure. They re-worked them about a decade ago but this looks to be a more comprehensive redo for the entire street. Below we see the old West Marine store now gradually becoming a  24-hr gym. 

The new West Marine will also get a fresh coat of asphalt on the street and even though the uneven surface is hard to photograph it is astonishingly bad:

I tried to capture the awfulness here against the afternoon sun:

The construction plans are also more sweeping than just a re-surface and better drains, its going to be a beautification project as well.  

The construction work has been designed not to interfere with the first amendment panhandling zone:

The idea ultimately will be to have Caroline Street street properly landscaped with nice sidewalks and cut outs and everything a good looking street should have, they say. Something like this maybe, which I photographed on William Street alongside the old West Marine:

This is a sample of the future design, a proper turnout built to accommodate the Marker Hotel newly built at the end of William Street, which you can see off to the left.  What you can also see is that traffic including bicycles is supposed to keep right...good luck with that.

The connector street past Cuban Coffee Queen and the Brewery will also need repaving as you can see:

It's another of those projects that are making everyone crazy, street closures, difficult access for businesses and general disruption but one can only hope that the finished product will look good, work well and not bounce me out of the saddle anymore. Oh and no more high tide flooding please. I think this could be pretty good.

 And check out the amount of equipment they've assembled to tackle this job!

Serenity will return to this corner of Key West.

Waterfront Brewery

A little Fantasy Fest content might slip into the pictures because my wife and I came here before walking down to Duval before the Grand Parade last weekend. Mind you swimsuits aren't unusual along the city waterfront.

The Key West Bight waterfront is owned by the city, it's one of those smart moves which pays dividends over the years and deserves to be emulated by sitting commission members. The land around the waterfront belongs to the city which leases it to the businesses. There is a public commission which overseas the property and which like every other transparent public entity, the Aqueduct and Keys a Energy included, comes in for rumbles of popular discontent. However, give them credit as the Bight is a pleasant place to walk and thus far is free of national chain domination.

The brewery is open to the water, the interior as you will see is sharp bright and modern and in our case service was perfect: prompt polite and friendly but not intrusive. So much so I didn't get the hist's name but he directed me to exactly the beer I wanted. They have half a dozen brews with only a couple of India Pale Ales so it is possible to try beers that aren't just bitter. My wife had a cider that was tart and refreshing and tasted of apples. We also got to see a growler you can buy and fill with beer to go. I wasn't going to carry that around with me but it's a thought for the future.

We ordered off the appetizer list, and if we couldn't finish it wasn't because flavor was lacking...there was a lot of food. The bruschetta was surprisingly good, a fish I don't often order but I was curious. The tomatoes were diced the balsamic was sweet and the mozzarella didn't taste mass produced. I assume it must be but it was good. I liked the mussels okay but the fish dip was the star, packed with and just enough binder to hold it together. I couldn't stop eating it.

Tim, one of the bosses came by (I did say this was Fantasy Fest weekend didn't I?) and we were glad to tell him things were peachy, because they were. The Waterfront Brewery is part of a local network of relatively new eateries across Old Town including the Porch which has got rather too popular, Yogi Berra style. The cocktail bar next door is not my cup of tea; Two Cents on Appelrouth Lane lost me with high prices poor service and a hipster vibe when it opened, and Kojin noodles, much adored by many, is undercut in my opinion by Sister Noodle in New Town. Badboy Burrito my longtime favorite has slipped too since I visited it at its new location at the Bottlecap, so all in all I wasn't expecting much here. I was surprise do andvpleased. I hope they keep it up.

There are of course the ubiquitous televisions everywhere but from the restaurant side of the divide they aren't as obnoxious. Plus you get to sit like an adult with your feet on the floor at the lower tables.

The building is vast (lots of lovely floor rent for my employer the City) and it's used to full advantage offering pool and shuffleboard as well as a couple of video game machines. Eventually I suppose it will become well used and beery but right now you could eat dinner off the floor or any piece of furniture. Which would be an odd thing to do but I like the sharp bright air of cleanliness. I don't suppose Hemingway would approve but he's dead and I'm not (yet) so I'll take it as it is.

I told you the place is huge and I didn't even look at the rooftop terrace...

This used to be the Waterfront Market, organic long before Publix figured people didn't want pesticides with their lettuce. It closed blaming the city for unreasonable rents and with went a hang out for water rats, a juice bar with WiFi, decent sandwiches at the counter and some fine people watching opportunities. Here are a couple of pictures I took "back in the day" when this building was still a market:

Like the old juice bar gallery, which is still three, inaccessible and unused, the front porch overlooking Caroline Street is there but nicer and more inviting.

And Rick Worth's art still decorates thevoutsidevof the building. Mutatis mutandis (at last I have found somewhere to use that absurd phrase) the Waterfront building still serves the community. And that I like.

I hope success doesn't spoil the place because I am still looking, not very energetically, for a replacement for Finnegan's Wake, the much lamented Irish pub of yore.

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