| Key West Trip Page 1 |
| Thursday, 10/2/03 Left home at 8:15 and rode I10 to Grand Bay, Alabama. Then South on 188 through Bayou LaBatre to Dauphin Island and the ferry across Mobile Bay. Got a long, 1.5 hr wait if you miss this one, but the waiting area’s nice. Boat launch nearby offers conversation with fishermen and a vending machine and pee hole. A strong North wind was blowing and rocking the bikes on the kick stands. Ferry put us off at Port Hudson, rode the beach road through Orange Beach, where we stopped for erster po-boys and iced tea for lunch. Took Hwy 98 to Destin, and it was getting dark, but it was a nice night and we didn’t feel like stopping yet, so we rode to Panama City Beach. We spent the night at Catalina Court, run by a dude and dudess with an FLH, so we talked bikes a while. Nice riding day, although fighting the strong N. wind all day insured we’d sleep well. Rooms on the beach side were over $100. This place was across the 2-lane from the beach and was $50..$25 each. |
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| Friday, 10/3. Woke up at 6 A.M. and Steve got the map out. That was our usual routine every day on this trip and the West Coast trip. Look at the map and figure a route towards our final destination for the day. He spotted Cedar Key on the map. Hey, here’s the first “Key” place, let’s ride there today. Sounded fine to me. At the motel dudess’s recommendation, we went to Hwy 98 and Coran’s for a great breakfast. Hey, you say, who can fuck-up eggs? LOTSA places, I’ve found. But these, and the grits and sausage, were great. Came back to the room for the double S(shit and shower), and were packed and on the road for 8.Riding out of PCB was nothing but concrete condo construction, very few places you could see the water, even though it wasn’t more than a few hundred yards away. Once PCB was in the mirrors, the beach became much more visible, so the ride improved a LOT. Mexico Beach and St. Joe Beach were spots probably unchanged for 50 or so years. Only a few low-rise motels on the water and unspoiled riding, sometimes within 100 feet of the water. Lots of purple wild flowers growing from the road to the white sand, mixed in with sea oats and some 4 or 5 foot plants that looked like small palm trees. Beautiful. Then we picked up 98 and turned inland. The ride was through thick forest, an alternately shadowed and sunny 2-lane. We hit 4-lane at Perry and stopped at Wendy’s for a burger. Then, down 19/98 to 345 at Chiefland, which took us into Cedar Key. Found the only motel with a room with 2 beds, kinda steep..$75. Unpacked and went to the fishing pier and a nearby strip of shops and restaurants. All very rustic and interesting.. We pigged out at Frog’s Landing, on raw ersters, crab bisque, and crabmeat-stuffed mushrooms. Walked to the pier where I talked to “Pelican Man”. “Yeah, you can take the picture, just don’t bother the birds.” He had one well-loaded- down Honda. An old lady had just caught a sting-ray and was fighting off the pelicans with her fishing pole. The day started pretty chilly, but had warmed up by evening. |
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| Sat. 10/4. Cedar Key to St. Pete Beach. Stopped at Homosossa Springs State park after leaving Cedar Key around 9. Lots of traffic on 19 South. The wildlife refuge was great. The underwater observation dome to watch the manatees was uptown. Watched ‘em munch down on lettuce. Lots of birds, too. Injured bald eagles that were mostly missing a wing and couldn’t be returned to the wild. They seemed to all be looking at the sky, knowing they’d never be in it again. 2 black bear cubs and deer, also, and a way lost hippo. Back on the bikes, through traffic down 19, then, at Holiday, took Alt. 19 and followed the coast. Many beach towns later, got to Treasure Island, just above St. Pete Beach. Stayed at the Trail’s End motel. Unpacked and took the long walk across a very wide beach to sit by the water a while. The sand was much coarser than the Emerald Coast beach area. Ate well again, at Shell’s...rock lobster cooked 3 ways and calamari. |
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| Sunday 10/5. St Pete Beach to Key Largo. Left around 9. Took Hwy 19 to 275, to I75, across the “Skybridge”. Maybe the prettiest bridge I’ve ever ridden across. Seems to climb a mile high. As you approach it, the suspension cables look like spread-out angel wings. Then, on the bridge, when you’re in line with ‘em, they’re so perfectly lined up that it looks like 1 cable. Got a lucky pic here of the sunlight and cables. Pics of this bridge couldn’t do it justice, though. You have to putt across it to appreciate the engineering and the beauty of it. Wouldn’t want to ride it on a real windy day, tho. Heard from the Harley Shop folks back at Homosossa Springs that it can start swaying pretty good. Since it was Sunday, we saw many bikes on this road. We took Hwy 75 through “Alligator Alley”, a $1.50 toll road through the Everglades. Nice scenery. Flat, open spaces. Wooded areas, mostly cypress trees. They had strange, large green clumps on them..unlike anything we know of from the cypress trees back home. And some areas a mix of small palm trees, palmettos and other scrub plants I didn’t recognize. Then, down Hwy 27 to Hwy 1 to the Keys. Stopped at the Keys welcome center in Key Largo and met a very sweel older lady, who recommended Amoray’s Dive Resort. A gawgeous place! Very friendly folks, all scuba divers. Had many motorcycle/scuba diving chats. There was a sandy, rocky “beach” at water’s edge, lounge chairs with palmetto umbrellas and all. We met Steve and Lillian. He’s from Wales and a diving instructor for the summer, and she’s from Chester, a town near London. He was one funny dude and we had a blast with ‘em. We all walked to Hobo’s restaurant, next door, and drank and ate with ‘em. The motel and restaurant and company were all 5 star-rated and we slept like logs. |
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| Monday, 10/6. Key Largo to Key West. We savored this 120 mile putt like sipping fine brandy. Took us 7 hours. Long stretches of beautiful water. Not as unencumbered a view as I’d pictured it’d be, though, as the water was blocked by trees and structures a lot. We stopped at a marina in Islamorada and spoke to a charter boat lady about fly-fishing the flats. She said you had to supply your own fly reel. The half day trip with spinning tackle was $300. We passed on that, too. When we got to Key West, we scouted around for a motel close to the water and found Southernmost Motel. Very nice place..had their own “beach” and pier. Pretty pricey at $119(and this is the OFF season!) But everything in Key West is expensive. Half a block from the Southernmost Motel is the Southernmost Post, a magnet for bikes to ride next to for photo ops. If you want to meet bikers from all over, just hang around this post. In 20 minutes, we’d met a couple on a BMW from N.C. and a couple on a Harley from Ill. They’d left Ill. In 40 degree temps and ridden 17 hours straight to Miami. Hardy souls. We put the bikes to bed, had a couple of beers at the beach bar, then went off the pier to swim in the Atlantic. Got a nice gash on my scrawny leg climbing down the ladder and kept listening for “Jaws” music.. We showered and walked down Duval Street. Art galleries, cigar-rolling booths, restaurants, bars, shops, and “Scrubs”, where you could rent a room and watch chicks dance naked. That’s what the sign said, anyway. Bought a few T shirts at the Hogsbreath and caught a seafood buffet where I pigged out on stone crab claws and boiled shrimp. Yeah, food is way high on my list. Got back to the room around 11 and, once again, slept like logs. |
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| Key West Trip Page 2 |
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