I am back in the groove of keys living, watching the thunder clouds mass, waiting for the rain, checking the lightning flashing behind the nighttime clouds, sweating and remembering to wear sandals when I get outside the protection of shade, or burn my feet as punishment for forgetting to remember.
We haven't had much rain lately, just the promise not fulfilled, watching the clouds blow in from the south or the west. And where are these blusterous winds coming from? the south? the west? what happened to the comfortable, usual southeast trades? The winds blow, thunder cracks and the rain clouds hustle off to the horizon and I take a bucket and pour water on my fledgling palms using air conditioning condensate.
I stopped on my way into work to photograph the splendid colors of summer's near shore waters and all I got was what you see, shades of green not reflecting at all the turquoise and aquamarine I see out there with my eyes but that I cannot seem to capture with my Canon. Grrr. I did capture this liveaboard going home after a hard days labor (maybe). He buzzed out to his boat from the Highway One causeway which crosses the north side of Newfound Harbor. Today was one of those days we envy the liveaboards snug in their floating castles, cooled by fresh breezes on slightly ruffled waters.
Further up the highway I pulled off to hit some back country I'd cycled through this morning. I spotted a collapsing shed, or boathouse on the edge of the sparkling waters of Niles Channel when I rode my bicycle out to the park known as "The Pool" which is simply a saltwater indentation in the coastline. The Bonneville snuck into the old structure picture as it always does, somehow. And in this case rather overwhelmed the old structure in the distance. I thought the shed looked rather Bahamian in its decrepitude.
I know I am enjoying the Bonneville, even after my vacation riding the super powerful, extra smooth, rented BMW. I know because when I stopped for gas I found I'd got 45 miles to the gallon (18 km/liter) which is two mpg more than usual which means I've been ambling more and revving less. Smelling the roses one might say. And because i stopped at the Big Coppitt Key Shell I got that five percent rebate with the Shell Mastercard, which at $4:34 per gallon of mid strength gas is a nice savings:
Of course Shell is making cash hand over fist these days, and I recently read an interview on the BBC with the jug eared leader of said corporation. He argued that more exploration would find more oil and high prices help to cover the cost of finding and extracting the new oil supplies. I figure we've already proved we're willing to pay $4 a gallon so why would they ever drop the price? The US has cut consumption by an anemic one percent and car dealers in Key West tell the Citizen newspaper that SUV sales continue apace. I have been saying for some time that if you want to see $2 gas, double the mileage of your vehicle and in Italy, where they pay nearly $9 a gallon they drive 60mpg cars. Which means they effectively already pay less than we do...and a Nissan Micra Convertible is a cute car, believe it or not, even if it is small. In the Keys I am seeing more two wheelers out on the roads and in people's driveways. Not all the riders dress the part of Serious Motorcyclists . This dude was wearing a leather flying cap of a style that went out of fashion before World War Two:
And his exhausts were loud enough to wake the dead. I think the lady in the car at the pump next to me thought I was the cause of the ruckus as I thumbed my quiet little starter at the exact same moment. I thought my engine had blown up and I think she wished it had.
The Bluewater Key RV resort is quite nice (we had a look when we were house hunting years ago) but its not really a solution for someone looking for a home. Its a space for someone who owns a quarter million dollar 4mpg motor home who wants the same parking spot winter after winter... and seen from the Highway it is quite attractive, in a South Seas sort of way:
Tiki huts and palm trees on the waterfront, with AstroTurf for the RV and all for a cool half million. Astonishing ain't it? People will pay astronomical sums for this stuff.
I'm going to keep on riding the Bonneville and photographing the Florida Keys. Now I just need the lap top back from its long hiatus while it was getting repaired. Today they say it should be back on my desk at home after a month without regular Internet access. I really miss having a computer in my home and its been a long month away from the Web. 
When we were kids Giovanni spent his summers at this end of the street and I lived in the castle at the other end, which I photographed by day:
The family mansion has been empty since I left and it was sold to some businessmen who had grand ideas for the grand structure that they have managed to do absolutely nothing with. There it sits dominating the village and deteriorating as only grand old homes know how. It looks like someone is in the downstairs study, but its just a street light reflected in the glass.
That picture evoked for me the endless winter nights sitting by the fire reading and waiting for the short cold days to pass. It was not a happy time for me. Not many people live in the village, even fewer than when I lived there and nowadays most of them are temporary, the equivalent of snowbirds in Florida. The empty square damp with June's extravagant rainfall I found had all sorts of angles for the camera:
The village was dedicated to the proposition that grain harvested had to be stored so they built large stone warehouses to pile the stuff into. Just because the buildings had a purpose didn't mean they couldn't be stylish:
And off the main piazza there's a road leading down to the back of the village where a few more hardy souls live, year round.
And of course there is a little shrine in the wall, the sort of shrine one sees anywhere in the world, even Key West. I photographed a similar display one night on Flagler Avenue and published the picture in this blog. Here's the shrine in the wall in Morruzze, taken with a flash:
And speaking of shrines this isn't the only one. The bigger of the shrines is at the entrance to the village, a chapel sized building surrounded by boxwood hedges and live oak trees:
The altar cloth was providing a snug residence for a couple of locals seeking shelter from the unseasonable rains:
My front door looks out on the main piazza and it was for many years my garage door as my first Vespa lived inside the door in a vestibule under the stairs as did all my early mopeds and motorcycles when they were small enough to fit:
Later I took to parking them in the main courtyard under the house, an area I stuck my camera in and fired off a flash. The "new" owners don't seemed to have developed a grasp of what to do with the space. I had the same problem:
Just looking at the pictures makes me miss my snug little 800 square foot berth on a canal in the Lower keys. Less is best, it turns out.
Architecture, History and Art, and I turned my back on it all. There's a proverb that comes to my mind when people ask, breathlessly why I left. "Those with teeth don't have bread while the people with bread don't have teeth." The bread for my teeth lies in the islands off the tip of Florida, not in the mountains of Umbria. Weird but true.
My childhood friend Giovanni rewards his 
I am rather less into labels than Giovanni, and less fashion conscious and generally rather less cool than I would have to be had i stayed in Italy. Therefore when we drop by the dealer to pick up my rental which is a favor to Giovanni, I get what I am given. Last year it was a single cylinder 650, this year it was a screaming 1200. "It goes from zero to 100 kilometres per hour (60mph) in about 2.4 seconds" 
163 horsepower is almost three times the power of my modest air cooled Bonneville twin at home, a motorcycle that will cruise happily at 80 miles per hour on the freeway and pull from 40 miles per hour in top gear, a motorcycle devoid of visible electronics. The BMW by contrast is a machine dedicated to being fast and smooth as only a wealthy mid life crisis machine can be.
Riding around town was a bit of trick what with the low handlebars which forced me into a hunched crouch, useful on the freeway but rather awkward to look over one's middle aged shoulder. I hunkered down behind the big hump of a tank and struggled to make sense of the famous clunky BMW gearbox. Once I got into second gear the street was mine- a quick twist of the gas and I was past any obstruction rolling along in front of me. this being Italy I was expected to flash past cars, squeeze through the narrowest of openings and pull past cars waiting at a light. the head of the line is the motorcycle's place in Italian traffic and the K1200R made short work of lines.
On the open road things worked a little better as the riding position eased the flow of wind and the handlebars gave me a firm grip to hang onto as the BMW accelerated like the hounds of hell were after us. It was astonishing.
After the pottery interlude I set off across open country towards the low lying hills west of 
It took me a few miles to get used to the immediate power response but I manged to ride through a couple of small towns without killing humans or cats and I started to feel I was getting the hang of the thing. The day was perfect, cool and crisp around 70 degrees (20C) with bright spring sunshine and big puffy clouds in the sky. Threats of rain seemed greatly exaggerated as I took corner after corner riding into the pine forests on Monte 
I found the BMW easy to ride on the open road, the position was perfect to control the beast on the turns, and when i caught up to the slow moving cages on the road it took but a second to evaluate the road and wind open the gas and flip past the offending obstruction. At home it happens that a slow moving car (any car when its a matter of the BMW!) appears as an obstruction, but in Italy motorcycles routinely ignore the lines in the road and car drivers often pull over to the shoulder to help faster moving motorbikes get ahead. Its very civilized though it can be nerve wracking splitting heavy traffic down the middle of those coming and those going. On Monte 
The scenery was pleasant enough I had to keep stopping to pull out the camera and enjoy the simple fact of finding myself here with nothing to do but ride and admire my surroundings:
The other side of the hill is less populated and I had lots of open road to enjoy on my way down. 
I stopped short of the city and took a side road back towards my destination. It was another pastoral scene, green fields trees and narrow bridges over a winding brook.
I had trouble passing a couple of cars because the rearmost vehicle kept pulling over on the straights to block me passing. I think my horsepower went to my head and finally I brushed past after hanging back for a while and catching the asshole by surprise after he lost sight of me in his mirrors. He caught up with me again when I stopped for a picture underneath the 
We 
For my sister 
After lunch I rode on another couple of miles to Elizabeth's twin Patricia who lives with her husband on a neighboring hill top. Before dinner we went for a ride as she still clings to the 
For some reason I was reminded of my many 
And as Sam Goldwyn was reputed to have said, "we have passed a lot of water since then." I like to think things are getting better in ways small enough to be almost unnoticed among the waves of ruinous economic and environmental predictions that swamp us daily. That small up beat note may be a benefit of visiting the past from time to time. 