Our Key West trip

Gofirstclass

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Apr 20, 2010
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Tri Cities, WA
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A couple of days ago I posted a photo I took on our trip to Ft. Myers and Key West. I figured I'd better post some more pics so OK, here's the skinny on this vacation. We flew to Ft. Myers on 12/30 to spend some time with my bro and his wife. They life on the 24th floor of a huge condo development (one of 7 towers) on the Caloosahatchie(sp?) River in Ft. Myers, right where Hwy 41 crosses. Down below us are two fairly good size marinas.

We took a boat tour of the river on 1/2 but no photos of that. It was pretty much like every other river except that it's huge.

We took off on 1/3 for Key West where we'd rented a two bedroom, two bath apartment that's a block off Duval St. We took a trolley tour of KW and walked out butts off in the 4 days we were here.

Here's a pic of the place we stayed. Nothing special from the outside but nicely decorated inside, with lots of room.
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There was a pool in back that we spent a few hours soaking in to cool off. Temps were in the low 80's and the humidity around that same level. Too darn hot and humid for this desert dweller.
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We went down to the sunset pier each night to watch the sun set over the Gulf. There were always some pretty nice boats out and it was nice to sit, sip some cocktails and just watch the world go by.
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Here's one of GW and me sharing some quality time as we watched the sun set. What a romantic place to be.
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Duval Street is party central for KW. It's about 1.25 miles long and much of it (and the surrounding streets) are filled with small bars, restaurants and shops selling all kinds of wares.

KW is known for the weird people to come here to visit and live. It's fun to just walk down the street and see the "artists" who hawk their wares along the curb. Here's a couple of pics of a truck that was parked along the street. Check out the bumper sticker....
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KW is also loaded with excellent restaurants. We were here 5 years ago so we knew some of them but we found a few new ones and visited one of the restaurants we'd been to before.

One of the things we did was tour Hemingway's home. He lived here for many years because of the good fishing. On the grounds are around 60 6-toed cats. They're free to roam around, get petted and just do what cats do....not much. I stopped to scratch this one behind the ears and he loved it for a minute but then stuck me with one of his claws to let me know he'd had enough. Damm nasty cat!
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We left KW on Wednesday and drove up through the keys. What a beautiful trip that is with the azure water, boats of all kinds and the Overseas Highway with miles of bridges. No pics of that, but as we drove north we took the old Highway 41 instead of the freeway to go back to the west side of the state. That highway passes through the Everglades. We stopped at an airboat tour place and took a 45 minute airboat tour through the swamps. Here’s where we stopped for the tour.

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And the boat we took the tour on. The boat has a 502 GM big block engine that’s turning a 54” prop. According to the guide it’s capable of running about 45mph. I don’t know if that’s true, but it planes easily with about 30 people on board.

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These boats are a kick in the pants. Several times we were on plane and the guide would kick the rudders hard over and put the boat in a sideways slide, and once he spun a 360* turn. Here’s a couple of videos of running through the swamps….


[video:youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvAM99Z-QVQ[/video]

[video:youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0S6XIAOx7Po[/video]

Here’s a pet boa constrictor that was at the airboat place. We all got to pet him. Snakes—yuck.

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One of the Everglades’ residents, a Blue Heron who stood patiently by while we photographed him.

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While on the airboat we saw two gators…
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When we finished the tour I got to wrestle an alligator. After a lengthy wrestling match I managed to get him in a sleeper hold and he went out…..

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Before we left Coopertown I got a plate of gator tail and frog legs, two Everglades delicacies. They were both breaded (not my favorite) but both were good. I’d had frog legs and they’re OK, but nothing real special. The gator was great.

From there we continued on west on Hwy 41. When we got to the point where the road turned to the NW we turned off the highway and took a secondary road (Hwy 94) that cut straight west through the swamps. It was a good choice because we saw numerous gators along the way. Here are a couple of pics of those. This one was huge, about 10’ long.

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That part of the trip was pretty cool because most of the gators we saw were only about 20'-30' from the roadway.
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We took our time going through that area and stopped many times to watch birds and alligators. We didn’t get back to Ft. Myers until after 6:00 so we went directly to the Smoke’n Pits BBQ in North Ft. Myers. I had a rack of ribs, GW had brisket and both were very good. The restaurant is a small one, just a plain place where you don’t need to get dressed up to dine. All you need are a good appetite and lots of napkins if you eat ribs.

So we’re back in Ft. Myers now. We fly home on Saturday and will be able to look back on another great vacation.
 
At least you had the right hat on. Will you be home in time for the game?

Shawn
 
Looks nice :thumbsup: Planning to go there with family in December next year
 
Great photos. That a really gorgeous part of the country, especially the Everglades. The air boats are great, had friends that lived down there for a few years and got to go out on a private air boat in the everglades for a day. Fabulous experience.
 
"What is the name of your brother's condo development?" Carter, it's High Point Place. This is a pic I took of it when we were on a boat tour of Ft. Myers....
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"At least you had the right hat on. Will you be home in time for the game?" No. Unfortunately we booked our flights at about the same time as the game. We may catch some of it in an airport bar before we leave, then some more at Denver. There's a party awaiting us in Seattle when we get back there and we're spending the night in Seattle, driving home oni Sunday morning.

The airboat was a kick in the pants. Our driver/guide was born and raised in the 'glades and knows it like the back of his hand. The next time we are down here we're going to book at least a 2 hour tour. Those boats have zero deadrise and no keel so it's easy to put them into a sideways slide and do a 180* or 360* turn.

This trip has been a lot of fun. My bro and his wife and my wife and I get along real well and have a lot of fun together. It's almost a non-stop joke and teasing session when we're together.
 
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Nice pics, pleased you had a good time although it's been a bit cooler lately:) Was the French guy with his tamed cats who do tricks still on the front at Key West? Amazing what he has trained them do.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
Thanks for the pics GFC!

Nice pics, pleased you had a good time although it's been a bit cooler lately:) Was the French guy with his tamed cats who do tricks still on the front at Key West? Amazing what he has trained them do.

I saw that show when I was there... impressive!
 
Thanks for the great pics. I am headed to KW for the first time in February. I am staying at the Southernmost on the beach. Looking toward to it
 
Duval Street is party central for KW. It's about 1.25 miles long and much of it (and the surrounding streets) are filled with small bars, restaurants and shops selling all kinds of wares.

KW is known for the weird people to come here to visit and live. It's fun to just walk down the street and see the "artists" who hawk their wares along the curb.
They call it the Duval crawl! :wink:
 
Nice post - thanks! Heading down to S. Florida Feb/March myself. Would love to spend 4-5 days in Key West but figured it's next to impossible to find accommodations during "high" season. Where did you come across your rental? - looks great!
 
We found our digs on Homeaway.com. We've used it several times to find places in several areas of the country. We've never been disappointed in the places we've stayed and found them to be as they were described in the writeups.

We had a 2BR, 2BA "apartment" with a kitchen, laundry facilities, outdoor pool, large living room and small kitchen. There also were two separate areas with futons that could sleep an additional pair each. Our total cost including the $85 cleaning fee was just under a grand for the 3 nights. My bro and I split it so it wasn't too bad.

What is expensive down there is the food cost. You can just about figure $15/person for lunch and $25-$35/person for dinner if you eat in restaurants. I haven't totaled up the food receipts (and won't because I don't want to know) but I think it would be close to $100/day per couple.


The guy with the cats was amazing. I can't even get our cats to do simple things like not get on the top/back of our couch. This guy had his cats jumping through fire rings, walking a tight rope, etc. Pretty amazing to watch.
 

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