St Petersburg

I get a strange bolt of nostalgia through my system when we pass by Demen's Landing in St Petersburg. Almost 30 years ago I lived here on my boat, a Flicka 20 by Pacific Seacraft for those who care about such details while I worked at a radio station in Tampa and before I took off sailing the Bahamas.

Despite the adventure it was not a happy time in my life, and I struggled to enjoy what should have been a carefree period in my early 30s. I did not handle my sudden insertion into a tight knit community very well and I felt like the awkward outsider which magnified my feelings of discontent. I was hiding from my stated plan to sail south and finally when I had made myself (and those around me) thoroughly miserable I forced myself out and away. Looking back I felt like my life in downtown St Petersburg was a catalogue of missed opportunities even though I sailed most corners of Tampa Bay I didn't really explore the shore side attractions very much at all.

I made two friends in this period who I still know and both of whom live in Key West so all was not lost...And St Petersburg today is a much more vibrant and dynamic city than it was in 1989. In those days it was still known with reason as "God's Waiting room" owing to the huge number of old people who retired there: the movie Cocoon was filmed there and very sweet it is too so watch it and enjoy a good flick. These days St Pete has a core of young people with the amenities they want and as it is a large city you will find all the services you might like but you will have to drive for them as the city is spread across a large peninsula.

The city marina at Demen's Landing offers secure berths and easy access to Tampa Bay which offers quite enjoyable sailing and lots of destinations between Tampa and the Gulf of Mexico. The waters tend to be hot in summer and are always murky unlike the waters of the Florida Keys...and I would miss the turquoise waters if I lived here. However the cost of living is much lower even though the population tends to be more staid and less eccentric than Key West. By a very long mile.

Demen's Landing, the park around which the marina is built is named for one of the two founders as explained by Wikipedia:

St. Petersburg was founded in 1888 by John C. Williams, who purchased the land, and by Peter Demens, who brought the railroad industry into the area.  As a part of a coin toss bet, the winner, Peter Demens, named the land after Saint Petersburg, Russia, while Williams opted to name the first hotel built which was named the Detroit Hotel, both named after their home towns respectively. St. Petersburg was incorporated as a town on February 29, 1892 and re-incorporated as a city on June 6, 1903.

WE walked the perimeter on this windy afternoon and enjoyed the relaxed ambiance of the park.  

The waterfront inside the marina:

Shade for the power boats, an idea I like very much in South Florida though the roof should be covered in solar panels, obviously:

They have their bums too apparently, trusting types who leave their carts unattended for a moment:

Time to go to the hotel. 

I was glad to get to take a short walk once again in my second or third favorite city in Florida. Some days I prefer St Augustine, some days I don't. Key West is always number one.

The Amphitheater

Earlier this week the city commission in Key West voted to carry on with the construction of a four million dollar outdoor concert venue at Truman Waterfront. They had a public meeting at which half the audience supported the plan, the other half didn't and the remainder wasn't sure. That adds up to more than 100 percent of those in attendance and I think it's fair to say this latest storm in a Key West teacup has left a lot of residents unsure. The whole of the waterfront is now pretty much a construction zone and something like this should emerge by the Fall:

At the meeting city staff told the elected leaders that were they to shut down the project plans and closure would cost the city half a million dollars which seemed to decide the outcome. The paper had previously checked around the state and the Citizen found that similar venues elsewhere generate almost no income for their municpialities, a suggestion Mayor Cates found annoying, musing out loud about the perception that a park should pay for itself. That notion was put about by the Spottswoods the premier family that wanted to develop a profitable concern at Truman Waterfront and whose plans were scotched nit by the city but by the Navy who said a firm "No" to the idea of a marina generating money as part of the waterfront park. Ever since then this notion of a park-for-profit has hung in the air, an emanation left over from thedeseprate Spottswood development plan.

Which is not to say the park will be a wild and interesting open space as I might like. It will offer facilites and paths and order and control. That at least is the impression they give. Meanwhile we drive through corridors of construction fencing, like travelers passing through Checkpoint Charley in a divided Berlin. Rusty is always ready to inspect anything, such is his curiosity.

Either the amphitheater will be successful beyond anyone's wildest dreams in which case traffic and noise will flood the quality of life in Bahama Village,. Or it will sit idle  most of the time and become a four million dollar monument to the Triumph of Hope.

Chickens

I was stuck at the Circle K waiting for a friend to meet me so I had two choices, read my Kindle on my phone which was pretty enticing as I am enjoying Havana Blue, a detective story set in contemporary Cuba, or I could play with my camera to pass the time.

There is a surprisingly large cluster of chickens at the Circle K at Mile Marker Ten.  I am no great fan of chickens unless they are on a plate but from time to time I do have to acknowledge that they have their fans.

Visitors to the Keys seem to think iguanas and chickens are first rate public ambassadors and I can't stand either creature. Iguana's wreck local wildlife and chew people's gardens to death and have no natural predators in these islands. Chickens meanwhile are noisy and dirty scattering soil and mulch everywhere in their search for bugs.;

I grew up around chickens and their stupidity is legendary however when you consider the adverse living conditions and  their survival rate I'd say the Lower Keys public chicken population has higher than average intelligence. They can be meaner than snakes too. One chicken ran Rusty off her turf on Appelrouth Lane downtown one day.

 A face only a mother could love ( or a tourist):

I like native birds like these ibis (below). They are quiet dignified and very swift at eating noxious insects. They don't crow at odd hours and they don't kick mulch across sidewalks. I think ibis are the ideal urban insect clean up crew:

Check out this hole: 

The source of Key West's free range street chickens is a mystery shrouded in myth. Some people think they came from Cub when refugees landed in the Keys with their prize cock fighters. This story makes no sense on so many levels I can't understand why it gets propagated so much. I don't recall any refugees in modern history arriving with roosters in their luggage; dogs occasionally have landed but birds from Cuba no, never. Plus if they did bring roosters who would they mate with to propagate the species on the streets?

I have also checked pictures from the early 29th century and none of the folk art I have seen, by Mario Sanchez for instance or Depression Era WPA painters show any signs of chickens in the street. The literature of the era doesn't mention them either. I rather think they got loose probably in the 60s when downtown was collapsing and gradually they evolved into a protected species in the city and a source of tourist largesse.

 In any event here they are and seem bound to stay.

 It's not that I hate chickens but I have no affinity for birds. People are fascinated by parrots but as far as I am concerned I am happy that they live decent lives and long may they do so, but studying them or trailing around behind them does nothing for me. I like dogs.

Chickens have been a source of aggravation too. They city hired a chicken catcher for a while but the humane traps he set out were sprung by well meaning chicken supporters so he had to give up did Armando Parra. I think he made more money from his line of authenticate Key West Chicken Catcher t- shirts than he did from his city bounty actually catching the birds.. 

 There are hundreds of these birds and their fate was much debated. The solemn promise from the city was that they would be rehoused at some sort of humane ranch setting somewhere on the mainland. Some opponents of the catching program envisioned a rather bleaker future like one of those Disney animal cartoon movies about secret slaughter houses from which the heroes have to escape.

 Chickens have their beauty certainly but they are noisy. And anyone who tells you they crow at dawn to herald the arrival of a new day are either misinformed or lying. They make a terrible noise any hour of the day or night.

But they are adaptable, making lives for themselves on the streets and prospering while ignoring the human chaos around them.

 I watched them for quite a while bickering over scraps and strutting around like school yard bullies.

They moved off and I walked up to the deck to keep an eye on the parking lot as I waited for my ride. 

 I don't love Key West's chickens but I don't wish them any harm. They aren't going anywhere and I suppose they shouldn't go away. It's all part of the pageant of Key West.

Audubon House

It isn't really the Audubon House, it's the Geiger House, though even in Key West these days the name Geiger sparks no recognition where Audubon is still a well known name. Audubon the painter ( and killer) of birds lived in Key West for six months before the Civil War. He never lived here in this house that bears his name!

As far as can be established he lived nearby and admired the trees growing around the house and Audubon is said to have picked a branch to use in one of his paintings of American birds.

So what you see here, recreated in exquisite detail is the ante bellum (pre-Civil War) home of one of Key West's most successful merchants. He made his fortune by wrecking, that is working as a marine salvager and charging high rates for difficult jobs.  This is a tool used to feed infants apparently and very ornate it is too.

The house is  nicely air conditioned these days but a hundred and fifty years ago I don't  know how they managed. And they had mosquito netting over the beds.

 I hope these were tools to deal with hair and not something like surgery:

The docent advised us the restoration was done using original patterns. The house stayed in the Geiger family until the 1950s when it was allowed to fall into disrepair. Then it was bought by an amateur historian who had it restored.

 Audubon's prints are also on display:

 And you get a view onto Whitehead Street:

This short video is well worth watching with a descendant of Captain Geiger telling some great stories abut life in those days:

 Then there is the garden:

Which makes for a pleasant place to hang out.

My previous essay on the house: Audubon  2015 Link