Packer Street is your basic utilitarian residential street, but because this is Key West it's more than that, it is in some mysterious way photogenic. I wanted to photograph a street because it feels like for too long I've been traveling one way and another and this blog has degenerated into an anywhere-but-Key-West diary. So I figured, a quick stop on Watson Street before I go to work and bob's your uncle. Instead I overshot Watson and ended upon Packer and was forced to admit even the most unpromising streets have too much stuff to photograph. There's a pretty decent restaurant:
My wife and I ate there shortly after "The Good Life" opened and we enjoyed sitting out on the porch. They have one of those eclectic American Grille menus with startling variations on old favorites:
Aside from this place the end of Packer Street that pops out into Truman Avenue dead ends into a popular Japanese restaurant which is a useful landmark to find Packer. My wife has eaten there and likes it, though I am reluctant to spend lots of money to eat bites of raw fish, so she goes with friends.
The entrance to Packer off Truman is bracketed by another sturdy landmark in this middle area of Old Town, and across from Kyushu lies this:
I am not overly fond of these streets south of Truman Avenue and I'm not sure why. Partly I think it's because they lack sidewalks and my sense of order is offended, not least because of all the cars jammed up against the edges make the place look untidy and crowded:
The reality is that Packer Street is, relatively speaking, a wide avenue compared to a lot of the lanes and alleys around town. Some of the main streets themselves aren't as broad as Packer and still traffic gets jammed here. Pedestrians don't though:
Packer Street has the usual mix of homes typical of any residential neighborhood in Key West:
House prices in Key West remain stubbornly high in the city (houses not on canals in the Lower Keys are dropping a bit) though bank foreclosures are supposedly working their way onto auction blocks. I see no reductions in prices among the desirable properties, the mansions the Conch cottage restorations and the like. Condos are coming down a bit and I've seen some of the South Roosevelt condos below $300,000 but among all the many homes for sale prices seem surprisingly strong. Better ask these people and not me:
I caught this yard filled with projects, which looked much more interesting to me than the neatly groomed snowbird residences further up the street. I particularly liked the upturned boat, a reminder that we are less than a mile from tidal waters, no matter how landlocked this street looks:
As usual I have no idea what this bush might be called but it looked pretty (as did the Honda which I identified as possibly a 700 Nighthawk):
Talk about utilitarian this next machine is the epitome of utility, a Honda Elite scooter, parked in front of a home.
The scooter is actually a mobile ad for the pepper store though it was painted by the inimitable, the late Captain Outrageous:
Another landmark, immobile on Packer Street, is the old fire station now in the process of being converted to a fire museum:
The cement structure in the foreground is a very rare watering trough used by the horses that pulled the fire engines back in the day. Nowadays the fire department has three modern stations strategically located around town, but when we get a 911 call from the "fire station on Grinnell" (usually long time Key West residents identify this location that way) we have to remember they mean the old fire station which is the museum here. And near there was my Bonneville, a study in green and white:
They are a civic lot on Packer Street because it seems Tuesday is pick up day for recycling and every home appeared to have a bin at the curb next to the trash.
The city commission last week back pedaled on mandatory recycling and now the city is limiting itself to encouraging people (and more to the point businesses) to recycle. It seems there may still be a plan to hire a recycling coordinator to increase the city's miserable recycling rate but the city is also showing a widening budget deficit so one has to wonder where the money will come from to gently encourage the citizens to recycle. Currently the city is projecting a 1.2 million dollar shortfall in a $38 million budget. And then by June, the end of the fiscal year things will surely be worse. Oh well, at least we have free sunshine.
Packer Street mysteriously attractive in it's way.
Which sign posting doesn't stop people who live in their vehicles parking there:
It has always struck me as a miserable way to live, huddled in a vehicle parked on what is a public right of way with strangers and the curious passing by with every opportunity to peer in the windows. Some people drive to Key West in vehicles better adapted to the liveaboard lifestyle:
There used to be an absolute plague of French Canadians in VW vans who flocked to Higgs Beach and sat around doing the parlez vous and giving Key West a European air with a Gallic flavor, tres chic. This year either I missed them last week, or they are late or economically strapped and stayed home to ice skate the St Lawrence for a change. In any case there are vans still parking at Higgs Beach:
The rule is that if your vehicle is over 20 feet (6 and a bit meters) you cannot park anywhere in the city of Key West. Parking control comes out with tape measures and checks and tows vehicles that are rated as over sized and parked on city streets. This one looks a likely candidate:
There are other arrivals in town who leave nothing at home, if they have a home, not even the kitchen sink, as they trundle around town in grossly overloaded vehicles:
Others lurk at the picnic tables with their bicycles:
These rainbow kids, young hippy types, which I snapped at the Lime Tree Food Store on Flagler, hang around town with almost no visible possessions. They are on foot and thus at the bottom of the automotive food chain:
On the subject of things automotive, this local scooter rider is letting the side down in my opinion. I have no idea what she's thinking riding around with all four indicators dangling by their electrical wires:
Tut tut. Not homeless but that poor Zuma scooter might as well be!
The US Coastguard cutter Mohawk was built in 1934 as a light ice breaker (!) for use in the Hudson River and it was designated as a Coastguard Power Gunboat (WPG). The Mohawk saw years of active service helping convoys across the freezing waters of the North Atlantic:
After the war the Mohawk served in the Coastguard for years until its engines literally gave out and it was towed to a scrap yard. By some miracle this ship, the last of its kind, was saved by a bunch of devoted former shipmates and it is still undergoing the process of restoration in it's berth:
The ship served with distinction during the Atlantic convoys, facing off against German submarines, a fact proudly recorded in paint:
The ship's crew saved 500 sailors from drowning and lost one's ship's dog overboard. The captain refused to turn back to save the frantically paddling dog and suffered the hatred of the crew for the rest of his time on board; such is the force of sentiment even in the middle of a war... and the story is still told by the devoted restorers working on the ship today.
The Mohawk attracts loyalty not only from former crew members but from the people who currently operate and maintain the ship at the dock. They have amassed a huge quantity of artifacts from the period and they talk avidly to former crew who come back to visit the old ship. The visit starts with a meet and greet with the man taking the money. He showed us pictures of the ship in action and pictures of the ice that covered the superstructure during winter convoys: 
The visit is self guided with the entire ship pretty much open to inspection and quite fascinating it is too, as the shop is filled with artifacts from the time it served in the war. First the galley (kitchen) where they made all meals for the 100 sailors and 14 officers on board. The stove operated on engine oil and apparently that same fuel seasoned the food according to some of those artifacts I mentioned earlier:
Then there was the radio room with it's type writers and it's radio equipment. And a photograph. I was told the operator photographed still comes back to the ship every year to keep an eye on it's restoration progress:
From the radio room there are steep steps to descend to lower levels:
To the wardroom, the communal area of the ship where people hung out together. The silver barrel in the foreground is a coffee urn, and the literature advises the tables in the background were well illuminated so they could double as operating tables...
The men shared modest quarters, all 100 of them, the petty officers shared smaller cabins but used the same primitive bunks to sleep on:
The officers in the rear of the ship (abaft) got greater comfort with more privacy and more luxurious bunks. However the whole proposition of putting to sea in a narrow beamed 165-foot ship was likely to be pretty rough. The ship rolled like crazy, something that was illustrated in a video made from an 8 millimeter film shot in Greenland in 1942. The video showed the successor to the drowned dog, called "Ricky Bow Wow" playing on the ship (his id card is on display next to the television):
Then we saw crew members trying to stay upright as the ship plowed through relatively small waves in the North Atlantic. I got seasick just watching the video:
The modern crew member and restorer we met in this area, Chip the ship's engineer, had tons of stories to tell about life on board the ship and encounters with crew including a former enemy. One notable U-Boat Captain came to visit the Mohawk told of seeing the Mohawk through his periscope while cruising for convoys to blow up. Chip kept Bruce and Celia entertained and I listened with one ear while I meandered with my camera: 
It was a great place to wander, check out the old pin ups (Mae West) and newspaper clippings of one sort or another, including the ship's newsletter:
And an original poster:
And there was the depth charge itself ready for launch on deck:
It was a cold windy day when Bruce, Celia and I visited the Mohawk, so they huddled and listened to the stories below decks out of the cold north wind while I wandered the corridors:
Then I poked my head into the steering compartment which housed the spare wheel:
Before heading on deck to brave the breeze and check out the topsides, working my way forward, starting at the fantail:
The Truman Waterfront seawall is a good place for the old ship to be tied up. It puts Mohawk right in the middle of the action, across from the cruise ships and in the same basin as the National Marine Sanctuary patrol boats, not to mention the current crop of race boats in town for the annual Southern Ocean Racing Conference sailing regatta. And the seawall is also part of the old navy base which is still visible in parts:
Indeed when this was an active Navy port this very seawall was where submarines, similar to Mohawk's old nemesis, were tied up. Happily those were friendly submarines, but not nearly as friendly and as welcoming as Mohawk is today.