All these pictures were taken between 2:30 am and three am yesterday, in the early stages of a vicious winter cold front, at great personal risk. Temperatures were hovering around 59 degrees Fahrenheit (14C) and the wind was howling out of the north causing the skin to tingle and the eyes to water. I started out on the more or less northwest side of the island Trumbo Point known in the bad old days as the Toxic Triangle. It got that nickname thanks to the power plant outflow from the Steam plant which is now struggling to become luxury three million dollar condos. The fresh clean waters of the toxic triangle were fairly calm in the 35 mile per hour gusts of wind out of the north:
Trumbo is where the school district has it's headquarters, valuable waterfront land the district had considered selling to raise capital, at a time when land sales had actual value. For now, the schools are led from this place behind a barricade of buses (and a Bonneville). Budget cuts are the order of the day so I doubt it is a center of great happiness at the moment:
Heading towards Duval on streets swept clear of humans by the freezing winds I spotted one of Paula's preferred lunch spots, B.O.'s. She agrees with me its an expensive place to get a sandwich but she is not deterred from her occasional treat. I used to work across the street and the smell of grilling and frying fish from Buddy Owen's open air restaurant used to give me pangs. Not so in the dead of night when all is cold and quiet:
Simonton Beach is a favorite hang out in the middle of the night, when I want a quick fix of fresh salt air. The beach closes at 11 pm but a quick stop in the early morning hours allows one to enjoy the sand and the pier without the incessant horde of residentially challenged that cluster on the beach in daylight hours. With north winds blowing through the harbor there was some modest wave action:
The wind was howling round the corner of the Pier House causing my motorcycle to shiver,which was inconvenient as I was using it to prop up my gorilla pod and camera. It took six different exposures to get one that was somewhat focused:
The cold front whistled across the Keys Friday morning, bringing a mass of rolling black clouds with it. When I got up at noon Friday it was a warm day, sunny and humid with the promise of the front to come. West winds gave way to northwest winds and a sudden surge of raindrops splattered my house and the temperature dropped from 79 degrees (27C) to less than 70 (21C) in the space of twenty minutes. Then the rain stopped, but only after I rode into Key West all bundled up in waterproofs and grinning madly at the wind blown adventure. For those without shelter the cold is a fact of life that has to be endured:
At the Conch Train Depot on Front Street I found a party tray left out by an absent minded entertainer.It was cold enough the cheese and carrots did not appear to be decomposing:
A while back, January 14th, Doug C in Ohio (see my Web list) ran a picture of a car in a blizzard with a Mile Marker Zero bumper sticker showing through the snow:
Which put me in mind of this:
The Mile marker Zero sign comes on every kind of gee-gaw you can conceive, including these ashtrays and neighboring tooth pick cups and piggy banks alllined up for sale at the Conch Train Depot. The other week I noticed some dork had once again stolen the actual marker at Whitehead and Fleming which happens from time to time. Perhaps the state should get some stimulus funds to pay to replace it. On the subject of Whitehead Street this is what it looks like at 2:50 am looking south from Clinton Square:
It was nearing the end of my lunch break so I took Fleming Street east out of downtown. The bars were closing early many of them, as Key West drinkers tend to be wussies when it comes to cold weather, and the sidewalks tend to get rolled up early. So I put the gorilla pod in the middle of Fleming Street, as one does, and avoiding cars turning off Duval took a quick exposure:
Then a quick turn onto Simonton Street with another turn outbound on Olivia and I passed a couple of proper Conch cottages before I realised I had to stop and photograph at least one. This one was all buttoned up against the cold:
And so, back to work.
There used to a Harley Davidson dealer on Truman Avenue called Hornes, but the old man got tired and decided it was time to retire. MamaJoe's, an old fashioned H-D repair shop in Marathon closed last year as well. Aside from the myriad scooter shops around Key West there are two motorcycle dealers, the Honda shop on Southard Street run by a Conch known for his extremely eccentric business style, and the more professional Yamaha shop on North Roosevelt which is strictly a Yamaha only shop. Boots Scoots, an independent repair shop gave it a try on Fourth Street but the owner got ill apparently and had to close. Bones cycles is now a scooter rental shop on North Roosevelt. Jiri at Stock Island Cycles on Laurel Avenue keeps on keeping on:
He's a busy man, now that he runs the shop by himself after his former partner dropped by the wayside and Jiri the entrepreneur takes care of everything. He hired his own assistant, a shadowy figure working on a scooter on one of the lifts:
Jiri chats with customers, takes appointments...and wrenches on bikes as well:
Like any self respecting old fashioned motorcycle shop Jiri's place is partly a social gathering spot, partly a repair place and partly also a showroom to look at different motorcycles on this variety starved island, even if they aren't for sale:
Jiri (pronounced: hee-ree) grew up in communist run Czechoslovakia before emigrating to the US in 1996 and ending up on Stock island doing what he knows best: fixing motorcycles. His hobby is racing and he has his own bike that he trailers up to Homestead for track days. He also gets to test ride customer bikes of course and he has a variety:
Jiri remembers going to watch motorcycle races at the Grand Prix circuit at Brno, before the Berlin wall came down, and he, along with his buddies, would check out the huge touring motorcycles ridden east from West Germany, and they would gawp, all envious as only small boys can be, and never imagined that he could ever ride, never mind own a machine like those sophisticated BMW's. "Now I fix them!" he grinned, surrounded by Western motorcycling decadence and enjoying every minute of it.
Jiri likes Japanese motorcycles for their reliability, but he works on anything he can order parts for and he has dealers in South Florida happy to ship him parts, including Pure Triumph in Fort Lauderdale. 
Pick up service is possible though I coordinate with my wife when I drop off the Trumpet, as she works half a mile away and she lets me borrow her Vespa if the bonneville is getting a tune up... Wandering the rows of tired and needy old motorbikes is always an experience at Island Cycles. I saw another of those typically Cuban rolling memorials: 
And typically southernmost-proud bumper stickers:
Locating Island Cycles (305 292 5444) is a bit of a trick, but the best way is to take the Highway out of Key West and at the flashing yellow lights turn south, past the Coral Hammock development, then take the first left towards Murray Marine. Jiri is next to the defunct propeller shop on Laurel Avenue . In the distance one can see Highway One running alongside the trees that line the Key West Golf Course:
Having Jiri's shop makes Key West feel somehow less remote when it comes to riding a motorcycle every day. Technical back up is no bad thing at all for a daily rider.
Here's something completely different, a lane that isn't in the historic old town part of Key West. Seidenberg Lane is a kind of alleyway that runs parallel to Seidenberg Avenue, which in turn parallels the main cross town street called Flagler, and while all these streets are paralleling themselves across New Town, little Seidenberg Lane goes almost unnoticed, not surprising when it starts off this busy street, imaginatively called First:
From the hustle and bustle of homeward bound commuters to the little lane was a complete transformation, old world Key West in full force:
Imagine that,kids just hanging out in the street (the lane actually) playing like we used to when I was small decades ago. There were adults keeping an eye on them from open doors (this is winter and thus considered not steaming hot) and I rolled very slowly through their midst. But such is the all pervasive influence of the pernicious television that I am sure I'd be taken for a pervert were I to stop and talk so I took a couple of surreptitious pictures and left them to it. I mean do they do this in your neighborhood streets, even in summer? 
Well, maybe they do this sort of outdoor playing Up North but all I hear is the lamentation that streets aren't safe for children anymore which seems a shame to me. Being outside was the best part of my unhappy youth. Be that as it may Seidenberg Lane gets very interesting (to a nerd like me) after it crosses Second Street:
It becomes a grassy alley, and considering the shortage of lawns in the Keys I'm surprised some enterprising Conch hasn't set up a goat to graze on a chain down here. As it was the grass was mown and I had the alley to myself, me and tall fences of various sorts:
Looking back the lane was bathed in a sort of light that brings to mind the long summer evenings of northern latitudes, especially with those kids playing in the alley. I couldn't believe it when one of them started twirling a hula hoop, like she thought it was 1950!
Not all of the lane was fenced in and I got to peak a little bit and even though this isn't the fashionable old town neighborhood beloved of the trolley tours I enjoy the views:
And then we have the eternal side yard projects:
Eventually the lane dead ends unceremoniously into Fourth Street, no signs, not even any clear markings of any kind. If you didn't know it was there you wouldn't find out by looking:
And after I had walked in a small circle to see if indeed the lane continued through someone's yard to a more natural conclusion on Fifth Street, which is a main artery, I turned around and strolled back. The kids were still playing in the light of the setting sun:
And all was right with the world. As long as you don't read the financial pages...
To say Park Key is a wide spot in the Overseas Highway would be exaggerating. Park Key consists of two signs, one at Park Channel and the other at North Harris Channel which pretty much defines this tiny uninhabited Key. And there's another exaggeration, it's not totally uninhabited:
At the spot along the highway where I stopped to take a quick stroll I found numerous spiders building cobwebs. I have no idea, as usual, what they are called but they are little square buggers, very industrious, who look like they are built of armoured plating. Their webs shone in the sunlight which made them easy to duck and avoid, but they and a few birds are the only residents of the half mile long Park Key. The island is basically a causeway connecting the two arms of Sugarloaf Key but it does have one small sort-of-turn out, which county public works has done it's best to make totally unfriendly:
The thing is, every time I ride by here in the dark my peripheral vision flashes a reflection or two back at me and I get this anxious feeling like something white with the word "Sheriff" could be parked here; an anxiety inducing feeling as the speed limit on this section of highway is a soporific 45 miles per hour...so I figured perhaps I would stop thinking about it if I took a short walk and explored the mysterious little area:
Of which there isn't too much to explore, just a gravel path through the shrubbery to the water's edge...
...which on a bright sunny winter afternoon at 80 degrees (27C) looked quite lovely:
They are quite obsessed about not parking here for some reason, and it verges on mania in my opinion because about the only thing that could get out here to get parked would be a skinny bicycle and I can't think why they would be worrying about that. Perhaps they have surplus quantities of "No Parking" signs to distribute around the county. Or perhaps they are worried about some half wit actually trying to use the old and very distressed boat ramp here:
So I stood there feeling all illegal and everything, neither using the boat ramp nor dumping trash but simply admiring the views off towards the west and Sugarloaf Lodge:
Or the not entirely dissimilar view to the east which is where Sugarloaf Middle school sits invisible somewhere among these mangroves:
And off to the north, barely visible sat a houseboat. I've seen it there for months and on a day like this the lifestyle looked enviable:
The boat was so far away my telephoto lense was hard pressed to pick up the boat, and it's Jolly Roger snapping in the breeze:
Back on land busy people were busy torturing themselves alongside the traffic:
And I had a motorcycle to ride:
Yes I know the road is all straight but it is still a great ride and now when I flash by after work in the dark early morning hours, I will have a better idea of what that white reflection is in my peripheral vision. Unless it's a Deputy Sheriff, lurking.