It happened that I was in town in the car because even I have not yet figured out how to haul 4 cases of mineral water 26 miles to my home from GFS, the bulk food store, on the back of a Bonneville. So I was forced to park the car on Elizabeth Street, the street closest to Duval without meters, and walk, which is anyway a pleasure. I saw a few interesting little things that I recorded for posterity. The cleaners on Elizabeth street for instance, that I find reminiscent of an earlier time, the terrazzo floor, the big fan whirring and the couch for the customers!
I am one of the few in Key West that really enjoy the summer heat that is upon us. I like the bright white light of summer, I enjoy the sheen of sweat that comes so easily to one's limbs, I like breathing the hot sticky air as I walk, I feel as though I am swimming underwater. I took a picture of the ATM at Bank of America which shone bright white in the sunlight 
Cycling is still something that people do, like mad dogs under the summer sun. I liked this guy, looking tired but unbeaten by the heat, on Bahama Street:
On Fleming Street the city wants to remind people that bicycles have to follow the rules of the road, and I rather liked this sign so I took a picture for no particular reason:
For some people its getting too warm to use their bicycles so they park the in the garage during the heat of the day. This is a typical Key West,Old Town garage:
Or, if you rented an apartment in Old Town you might have a flight of stairs to climb, a long one too, like Jacob's Ladder. It looks romantic but imagine a 600 square foot apartment with uneven floors and funky cupboards cooled by a noisy expensive window air conditioner blowing cold air in one spot. And for all this at the top of these stairs, or any others like them, you could be paying $1200 a month. 
I mention it as an example, to remind those of you contemplating a move to the coolest city of a possible pitfall. Perhaps the person living in this Paradise pays just $500 a month and monitors the homeowner's cat. You just never know. On the subject of homes I liked the plaque on this porch, not to mention the balloon:
If I lived in Old Town I'd like a brass sign like that on my porch. I'd like friends who sent balloons while i was at work, too, though I have no idea what this is all about. When writing about downtown key West one feels a certain obligation to illustrate the streets with any number of pretty conch homes. Here's one of no particular merit or demerit for the record:
I like the combination of formal frontage combined with the greenery and the delicate porches; Tara meets Conch. There is a ton of them like this around town, you practically can't point a camera without snapping one.
When I did the essay on pocket parks I missed this one on Southard Street just off Duval. Its not a real park at all, its just a small open space with unfortunately no benches to sit on. But it does have a wrap/sandwich shop with pleasant open air seating and my doctor's waiting room looks out on Key Lime Square and he keeps some frigid air conditioning in his office:
Back up Bahama Street I saw a sight that I walk past unnoticed any day I'm on Southard Street except when I am on the look out for things to look at and photograph:
Some people don't seem to quite get the concept of old Key West, the narrow streets, the short distances, the lack of space to swing a cat in:
Others embrace Key West's preference for alternative transportation, an embrace that goes back far beyond the first stirrings of high cost gasoline:
Note the black garbage bag for a seat cover, the absence of a left hand mirror and the ever useful basket. These old Honda Elite 50s haven't been built for years but they keep on running. Mine carried me down the Boulevard at 38 miles per hour day after day on my way to work downtown. I regretted selling it when I went for the flashier and unreliable Stella 150. I view all Elite work horses with a certain fondness these days.
Recently when I did an essay on Fleming Street a reader pointed out that Key West may have one of the best needlework stores anywhere, so this time I stopped by. Julie, the owner laughed when I told her I had never seen her store- she's been in business here for 22 years, across from Faustos, and started on Duval in the mid 70's and says she still finds lots of people discover her for the first time. She thought my travels around town learning to look at things for the first time was cool enough but I was blown away by all her pictures and designs for needlepoint, an activity I know nothing about:
We had a good time reminiscing about the good old days, the baseball diamond on Peary Court and the commissioner who locked himself to a tree. And all that stuff about how regular people continue to live in Key West. She's thinking about closing for the summer now that her kids are in college and heading north to escape the heat.I had to high tail it out of there to get to my movie and there was but one more fleeting picture to be taken on the way:
This used to a Dunkin Donuts franchise but they withdrew from the city when the only people their local store seemed to employ was undocumented workers. The Feds made a very well publicized bust and the corporation seemed to get cold feet about the warmest, southernmost city. Now the outlets are on their own. Despite the fact I work for the Police department I have never been in since the changeover. I shall have to change that, as research, you understand, for this blog.
I had no memory of Criss Cross, a 1990 film set in 1969 and shot in and around Key West. I am frequently ready to ditch a movie because I know the location and the plot ruins it, or vice versa I'll watch a movie only because I know the location and the plot is just an irritant. Criss Cross really does show Key West as it was in 1990, and completely recognizable today but the plot itself is entirely worthy if one had no interest at all in the shooting location. In this case the Eden House on Fleming Street, rendered shabby to illustrate the era:
The plot is simple enough, Goldie Hawn's character is divorced from Keith Carradine's and while he mopes in Miami ( they pay a visit from key West illustrated by footage shot on the old Seven Mile bridge:
And very evocative it is too, with all camera angles masking the presence of the modern bridge). 
I liked the local scenes which were integral to the plot and not too outlandishly misplaced. Truman and White Chevron after a summer rain:
And the old Peary Court long since lost to Navy housing. This shot can be placed by the presence in the background of the White Street Armory towers:
And an unusual shot, rendered impossible since 2001, of the underside of the Coastguard Piers:
The plot moves along merrily against the backdrop of the first lunar landing and I found this movie to an entirely enjoyable treat. We shouted out the locations as it moved from place to place and none of us fell asleep. 
As it was earlier this week:
As for the plot, the video store clerk glowered at me darkly and muttered something about hoping I wasn't too attached to the No Name Key bridge as it wouldn't look the same again to me. I slunk out clutching my films hoping I wasn't in for too much gore. I am no fan of horror films. The movie locations made little sense in relation to reality, because in another scene the booth looked like this:
Its actually a love story, boy meets girl kind of thing and the story goes downhill from there. There are a number of unpleasant people lurking around the tollbooth where he works and the gas station where she works, and the bait shop owned by the third leg of the triangle. It's a story in the style of Carl Hiassen involving road kill:
A fear of butterflies (?!) and trailer parks in the stereotypical Florida style:
All of which combines for a bizarre story with a surprising outcome. I rate it as okay, but by its nature a tollbooth is a pretty static location for a plot and the fact that the booth is known to be on a road to nowhere in this viewer's mind makes it a little harder to get stuck into the plot which in any case is not based on a realistic premise. In my estimation it was fun but not exactly compelling. Same tollbooth supposedly looking completely different than earlier in the movie...
Ah yes, but the Keys are always pretty to look at. 
There was no shelter for the Bonneville so I had to leave it out in the sun, poor thing, while I took off on foot. The signs were faded and illegible but I knew they indicated this as being a National Wildlife area so I wasn't going to drive the Bonneville down the trail:
The path through the mangroves started out in typical style, firm and dry underfoot lined by the pale green leaves of black and white mangroves stretching off to the horizon:
Well, I thought to myself, this won't take long. I strode along in the sun congratulating myself for taking some time on a work day afternoon to knock off this pending exploration. I had sunscreen on my nose and ears and though I lacked water I wasn't going to be gone long as clearly there wasn't much to see. I saw some grass at one point along the trail and it looked unusually pastoral for this part of the world:
I poked around and started to get an inkling that perhaps I might like this place more than I had at first thought. There was a car lurking in the bushes. It had been there so long it was rusted though and it lay sprawling under a mangrove tree that was actually growing through it, impaling it, leaving it with doors flung open and its bodywork brown with corrosion barely visible:
I couldn't help but wonder what it's story was; taken out and dumped ignominiously. Around the corner from the carcass of the car was a gate that screamed Mel Brooks to me:
It sat there bravely guarding its space which was open on both ends. Who knows perhaps it locked the wrecked car inside, those many years ago.
And as if I needed further proof that this was a bridle path I came across these in the crusty dry clay left behind from a rainless winter:
I think this place would be a positive marsh after a downpour, and underneath the mangroves I could spot puddles of water here and there and vast areas of more dried clay:
And then around a corner in the path I found a puddle of epic proportions, deep dark and mysterious. As lakes go it was small, and really outside of the Keys it would probably not rate as a pond, but this is Cudjoe Key so I call it a lagoon of what is, in all likelihood fresh water. I wasn't about to taste it though: 
And I could hear some pretty heavy rustling from the clump of mangroves on the other side of the water. It could have been the light west breeze shuffling the dead leaves...or could it have been...an alligator? Nah, I don't think there's enough water to support a dinosaur out here. Besides the prey would be pretty sparse wouldn't it? Key deer at the drinking hole, birds perhaps and the odd motorcyclist sweating by as a pedestrian in his sneakers...I kept moving briskly.
This giant piece of rubbish was not representative of the trail as a whole because of human trash there really wasn't much at all. I saw a couple of pieces of plywood (?) in the mangroves and very worn tin cans far off the trail but that was about all. It was pristine. Except for signs of vehicular traffic in the mud:
And clearly the ATV riders had some fun kicking up spray into the mangroves as they went by:
By now I could discern marine engines racing, deep throated, up the channel alongside Cudjoe to the east and the breeze seemed stronger the closer I walked to the water, which was still unseen through the mangroves. Except when it wasn't! A finger of salt water pushed through from the middle of the island a perfect canal penetrating deep into the interior. I needed a kayak:
And so I called it a day. On a map I measured the walk at just over a mile and a half, and there does appear to be the possibility, depending on water levels, of connecting by trail to the Spain Boulevard area off Blimp Road. That would explain the evidence of horses as there are stables on that part of Cudjoe.
And so I turned and started on the return journey down the long winding trail of hard packed dirt and mangroves:
I took a break, in the sun lacking shade, and in so doing I observed that which I had been taught in class. Because mangroves flourish around salt water some people believe, erroneously, that they survive on saltwater, but only in a manner of speaking. They absorb the saltwater, but have adapted to expel the salt through their leaves, which die, turn yellow and fall off taking the salt with them. These white mangroves had salt coating their leaves:
I can't remember the ins and outs of all the botanical details, they never stick in my brain, but there it was, salt on the leaves. At this overheated stage I could have used some potable fresh water as the path through the bushes was snug and breeze free.
In winter it is very pleasant to be out on a brisk 65 degree (17 Celsius) day with a strong north wind blowing overhead and to find oneself snug among the leaves and branches, listening to the wind ravish the crackling palm fronds and mangrove shrubs. In the heat of summer it is rather less so. But in the distance the baking summer sun illuminated a few tin roofs reassuring me that the civilization of Cudjoe Key was to hand:
Home, home to air conditioning, ice cold water and shade. Exploration is all very well, but in summer its best enjoyed in moderation, especially when you have a night's work ahead of you.