Lost In The Mangroves

A few pictures of us enjoying the wilderness, far from holidays, crowds and traffic.

Florida Keys winter with Rusty.

Garcia's Seafood

Van and Philip made early reservations at Garcia's a sixty year old tradition on the Miami River.It's atmospheric but is the food any good? Big question that...

First of ll you can walk your dog through the hall to the back deck if you want. At first we left Rusty in the car but my eagle eyed wife spotted a dog water bowl among the tables so she went out to get him and walk him in. One point for Garcia's right there. 

 Let's be honest, the view is wild. Down the river you can see what Philip calls Manhattan South, a city threatened by sea level rise and intensifying hurricane seasons, but a  city that doesn't give a shit. And in that crude brash way that Miami has, it tells the world it doesn't care by throwing up mile upon mile of high rises. There are cranes out there pushing more columns of metal and cement into the sky even as you read this. Miami Beach is actively pumping the ocean out of its streets at high tide but metro Miami is growing relentlessly.

Philip (white hair on the right) told us of friends they have, because he and Van are unnaturally sociable...anyway this friend is renting a loft in Little Haiti for $2700 a month and lucky to get it. Gentrification is sweeping Miami as retiring New Yorkers have apparently discovered Florida's amazing tax benefits.

 In the picture above you can see a floating billboard which I managed to photograph as it displayed an ad for a South Beach food event coming up when TV persons will escape the drab urban snowfields Up North and do silly things under the palms down here to raise money for charity and to raise their own self importance. Beware then, I am hip by association, as I drift through the modern sunny capital the union of north and south America.

Oh yes, we ate food too. Staff at Garcia's are professionals and extremely friendly even as they are capably handling your order and your wife's high maintenance "on the side" requirements. The crab cakes were made of crab and quite delicious. Each one was a $15  starter ( we no longer call appetizers "appetizers" as they are now British "starters." Whatever, I told you we are hip).

 Van looking pensive as well he might. A sudden winter rain storm blew down upon us as Layne went to the car to get Rusty. She got soaked and closed the car windows and Rusty came skipping in delighted to see me and fascinated by all that was going on around him as usual. As I watch Rusty absorb the world around him I pity those poor dogs that live on chains or never get out.  I know dogs love sharing our lives no matter how much we are told animals aren't like us.. 

 Meanwhile the fish was for us, cilantro sauce and some spicy Peruvian yellow sauce which my wife and I shared.

The waiters were as friendly and welcoming as you'd like without being intrusive and as darkness fell

 the clouds opened up and a burst of thick heavy rain fell on the proceedings like a curtain of water. The tables at water's edge got drenched and the early birds who snagged prime seating had to retreat. I kept eating my fish while a small stream of water went down my back. the awnings did their best but the rain was heavy. and then a cargo ship came down the river, backwards, right past our table.The tug at the back got pulled sideways for a while and nearly went under water or so it seemed...all ended well of course and they disappeared round a corner in the river. Just another working night on the Miami River. For us it was a special night out in Manhattan South! Great stuff indeed..

Rusty kept his equanimity and sat underneath the table watching the world go by. I never gave him a single french fry while he sat there either. On my word your Honor it wasn't me. Vicious slander.

But it was me that got us into the flan for dessert. Of course no one else wanted to admit to wanting a great  big glop of sugar but each of us had a spoon to taste the thing. It was excellent, not sweet but surrounded by liquid nectar. So there: no wanted it; everyone enjoyed it.  

Anthony Bourdain liked this place, at least he said he did on his TV show. I can see why, as the place is rough hewn the welcome is genuinely cheerful and the fish is perfect. Get there before six in the evening if you want to avoid the lines, if you aren't famous or on TV or something. I'm none of that so we were driving home a little the damper for our experience by 7:30. That's neither very Miami nor very Latin Americans but here's the thing: I'm actually not at all hip, not even in the capital of southern hipness,Miami.

Ann Street

The Curry Mansion looking excellent from Caroline Street. The tree lost to Hurricane Irma, as bad as that was, makes it much more photogenic.

Ann Street is two blocks long between Front and Caroline Streets. 

This is next to the Key Lime Bicycle Tour offices. Seems about right.

Caged Conch Tour Trolleys. They have a large barn filled with them on Ann Street.

I sit in the 911 center but quite a few people sit around town guarding parking lots.

If you can find Two Friends Patio you have found the corner of Ann Street.

A short street, a gentle introduction to the New Year. Many Happy Returns.

Red Dawn

The Old Bahia Honda Bridge from West Summerland Key.

 I showed up to walk the dog and with clear skies I was not expecting much in the way of sunrise.

 I was surprised.

 This one got lots of comments on Instagram. The big question: did I enhance it?

 I'm not sure why that matters but what I did when i saw the boat crossing the horizon...

 ...was to zoom in on the boat thus cutting out the orange shades further up in the sky.

 After that excitement some waders caught my eye playing hide and seek among the rocks.

 And of course a few stark reminders of the passage of Hurricane Irma through these parts in  2017.

Downtown With Rik And Rusty

It happens from time to time that I get stopped on the street by someone who reads this page, and I don't suppose I have to mention this happens a lot more often when Rusty is in fact with me. Thus you might say  Rusty gets stopped when I happen to be tagging along. So it was before New Year's Day. I recoiled a bit as more often than not people who come up to you on Key West streets want money or information. My disguise as a tourist with a camera round my neck usually keeps information seekers at bay but it does make me look like prey for the scammers.

Instead it was Rik who was wearing a  jacket, a first hint that maybe he is used to the tropics. We talked for a while as we had a couple of things in common. He lives on a tropical island, a Dutch island as he himself is Dutch and he knows Webb Chiles. Indeed he sails a Pathfinder similar to the boat Chiles used on his well known open boat circumnavigation a few decades ago.

We chatted and he wanted to go for a walk with me so we set a date  via the Internet and I ended up driving into town with Rusty for a walkabout. 

Rik was a toddler when his family moved to Aruba and he has lived there ever since so I called him the Aruban Conch. Describing him as a Conch (pro:"konk") confused him at first. I explained that he is as native to Aruba as someone born in Key West thus he is native to his place of residence: a Conch. This convoluted way of thinking eventually overcame his scruples when I added my own belief that where you graduate high school confirms your roots. Anyone can be born in Key West but how they torture you in high school is how you see the world as an adult. At least that seems to be the case in the US.  Ha, said Rik in his fluent English, I formed my lifetime friendships in kindergarten in Aruba. Yup, I said. You're  a Conch. 

Rik likes to do well by doing good. He works naturally in the internet technology field on his 70 square mile island  20 miles from Venezuela. He consults, he travels, he wants companies and people to do well. He also likes the US a great deal, and when I say the US I mean above all Key West. He vacations every year on this island which I find a little odd considering Aruba is Key West with a Dutch flavor, more or less. But Rik the engineer loves Key West architecture and he wants to build a house in the Key West style in Aruba.

 

daily Telegraph from the web

It's a funny thing. I've never been to the ABC islands in the southern Caribbean, Aruba Bonaire and Curacao all colonized by the Netherlands, all outside the main line of Caribbean islands fought over by the European powers and all three of them are models of clean efficient colorful trade and tourism. Check any picture collection of  these places and you will see classic gabled homes in bright colors, like dolls' houses burnished by the tropical sun. Lovely. And there I was with an Aruban extolling the virtues of Key West architecture. 

We talked of this and that including sustainability and how little use either place makes of solar energy. I am of the opinion that to make solar work you have to create a plan that allows utilities to make money off solar energy. The paradigm in force at the moment creates a drain on utility income every time a new solar panel is installed on a customer's roof and that has to change. I'm not sure how but when Rik told me a similar tale of limited solar deployment on his island even closer to the equator my conviction grew that we are going about solar energy all wrong.

There's a lot to like about Key West and I enjoyed walking around listening to Rik the engineer's considerations about living in a small space. He has dogs but he says he can't walk them on the postage stamp where he lives. That makes it a no go for Rusty and I!

Rusty enjoys his urban exploration but he also loves the mangrove roads along the back country scrub land. I have to confess he seems to perk up too in cooler weather even though he has grown up, not in kindly environments, in South Florida. 

I notice too that  Aruba is south o the hurricane belt, for now. Climate change and sea level rise was on both our minds. Rik says the Netherlands is developing a  fifty year plan to evacuate people at risk and Aruba will have to do the same, as things inevitably change in worlds so close to the sea. In the Keys insistent flooding is not a subject we face up to with much equanimity. 

And just like that Rik the engineer is gone back to Aruba, to his business of helping people and his neglected sailboat which he says he is going to take out more often. There's another thing: I'm not sure how many destinations there are around an island like Aruba...But unlike me Rik has no desire to check out the horizon, he has a home a business a family and an island to call his own. No need to mess all that up. He is content.