Very few people get off a plane and head straight for the beach, even before making a pit stop at their hotel.
But we did, because amazing white sand and gorgeous aqua water topped with clear blue skies are irresistible.
Sam opted to beach himself upon the shore. Andrew and Jen opted to gift him with some manmade assets.
I opted to do push-ups in zero gravity
I went snorkeling for the first time. I haven't been swimming since I was 7 because of ear problems, but I finally found ear plugs that don't leak. Huzzah, I have discovered a whole new world! We found this shell at the bottom of the water. Lest you think we're super amazing treasure hunters, the water was maybe 5 feet deep at that point.
After that, a batch of us drove down toward the Keys (from Ft. Lauderdale). It was a very low-key drive, since the speed limits down that road are seriously wimpy. It's to protect the endangered indigenous deer species of the Keys... which are, apparently, dwarf-sized version of "real" deer. Hah! I never saw one, unfortunately. I hear they're dog-sized. If you read the Wiki on them, it's pretty funny. Apparently they swim well, though!
Late that night, Oliver and Andrew arrived and Sam had his favorite person back again. They roomed together back in the day, and Sam has never been quite the same since.
We did a lot of walking, since we returned our rental car. But on an island two miles long by four miles wide, who needs cars? (A: We did still need Jen's truck quite often, heh)
Obviously, key lime pie originates from Key West. And so do limes. And cookies. And... Anyway. I liked the colors.
Pretty gorgeous
This prompted my Facebook status for last week: "I pity anyone who did not grow up around palm trees"
Bird faces!
I had no idea mahi mahi were so ugly
Someone wants a date
Delicious foooooooooods
More
And yet more (lobster tail)
I pushed myself quite a bit this past trip to do things that challenge my comfort zones. I went swimming (in water where I couldn't touch the ground!), snorkeling (although I prefer having something floaty so I don't have to work so hard), and ate shrimp (even though it was Royal Red deliciousness from 200 feet under the sea). It all worked out very nicely for me.
We hit up a hot sauce sampling bar.
This is some nifty jewelry. Key West, btw, is a delightfully tacky tourist trap of stores offering anything from beach cover-ups to expensive antique teak furniture.
This is for Olivia
A clever knife holder for feminists
PUPPYYYYYYYYY
We had a [few?!] brood[s] of Key chick babies living literally in our backyard.
One would invariably get separated from the others and start cheeping extremely loudly until it found its way back to its siblings. After one or two impassioned rescues on our part, we learned to just ignore them because they didn't appreciate our efforts anyway.
I really like how the one on the right is looking quizzically out on the world. I love birds how birds look when they "look" straight ahead.
Funny photo. I called out their names for a photo, but they didn't hear me until my tone took on volume and urgency. So they were worried something had gone wrong.
The crowds watching the sunset at Mallory Square.
Which is depicted here for your benefit.
These awesome performers gave us a great show. I, in turn, gave them a very massive tip.
This, now that I think about it, might be a slightly awkward photo capture moment unless you realize he's juggling fire batons while the guy does a crazy split/leapfrog move over his back. Otherwise it just looks like he's staring at... yeah...
They had awesome personalities and reminded me of all the books I used to read about circus performers.
You'd tip like I did if YOU saw someone juggling real knives while standing on another guy's head.
Or doing head-stands with just a cushion for comfort
I then proceeded to get a henna tattoo of a phoenix on my back. The idea was for it to block out sunlight so I'd have a reverse tan mark once the henna faded. That part was unfortunately unsuccessful, but the experience was otherwise pretty fun.
My friends do really random things.
I just realized that Oliver looks like a super skinny Sam here. We had a four-bedroom/one-bath beach house rental. Mostly ideal, and we figured we could make the one-bathroom thing work out. The bathroom had other plans... the shower clogged within the first night of our arrival, and the toilet died early the next morning. Awesome!
We ended up having to drive over to another beach house every day to take showers... which turned out to not be so bad, because that other place was pretty swank. You'll see parts of that house later (mostly just the pool). Hygienic situation aside, our rooms were quite nice. And we had just the right number of guys/girls/married people to fit in the rooms perfectly.
Unfortunately, Sam and Oliver found themselves to be incompatible bedmates, despite general appearances.
Andrew carrying two sets of seriously heavy dive gear :D
Henna tattoo cameo appearance!
Sam's... reverse henna tattoo? (We only did this for the photo op; he doesn't actually have a middle finger sunburn on his back. He does, however, have raccoon eyes from wearing shades)
In exactly this shape
We're waiting around here to get on a boat to go snorkeling. Whoo whoo! I was somewhat worried, going into the experience. I didn't want to, like, drown or something. Or have something nibble on my toes. Even if it was cute.
Once I put these on my feet, the worry regarding toe-nibbling, at the least, was alleviated.
Pre-departure. I found the Keys beaches and surrounding waters to be amazingly gorgeous and CLEAR. I'm secretly a little glad the oil spill (which was the talk of the town, of course) decided to head toward the Gulf instead of out toward the Keys. The Gulf is ugly enough; it isn't as much of a loss, in my opinion.
This is Nathan, Andrew and Jen's friend
These are tarpon, huge scavenger fish that live near the docks around the island, scrounging off of scrap food tossed out by tourists and restaurants. They also draw sharks. Note: Lest this photo make you think they are tiny, watch for a photo to come.
This is from the day we went fishing in the ocean. I was pretty psyched to catch something, and was disappointed when my valiant tackling (keke) of grimy bait in the form of hacked-up fish and squid was rewarded only by one successful catch of an inedible fish and two escaped would-have-been victims. Oh, I also had my bait stolen several times... At least it was a lot of fun, and I truly enjoyed being able to see mostly down to the bottom of the water (it would probably have been clearer if there hadn't been as much wind making the surface of the water pretty choppy).
Nathan gives us his best Titanic photo moment
Chancy
Sam!
Nathan, Andrew, Jen
Toward the end of the morning, I started feeling somewhat dehydrated so I was glad whenever the sun went behind a cloud
Our amazing catch! (That's somewhat sarcastic; we caught 12 fish between the 8 of us, no thanks to me :|) We had 24 bitty fillets.
Here's that photo I promised you for scale. Those tarpon are seriously big! And somewhat disturbing, yet pretty in an ugly-faced kinda way. I'm unfortunately told that they don't taste very good. Otherwise I think I could have easily redeemed my reputation as a bad fisher. (Maybe. Gimme a net, I say!)
After fishing, we decided to cool off by jumping in the pool at that second beach house I mentioned.
I'm the sort of person who sits calmly by while my friends drown. Just kidding. They were having a breath-holding contest. Sam came in at 1'36", Andrew at 1'54", Oliver at 2'12", and Nathan at 2'16". Impressive. I get bored after 20 seconds.
Nancy developed some interesting situations on her back that intrigued everyone. (Some kind of rash?)
I developed a serious tan. (these following two shots are taken by Sam)
We went to Walgreen's quite a bit.
We got a gold Mustang as our rental back out of the Keys. I don't think we requested it... it's just what we were given. Florida in style, eh?
This was just a posed photo, but I did get a chance to drive it about half of the way out. The last 45 minutes were pretty exciting, because I was trying to beat the clock to get us to the airport in time to drop off the rental and check in... against speed limits and rain. The irony of it all is that I got away with doing 80 in a 55 zone in Miami, but got a speeding ticket driving up to Dallas later that night. :|
We turned my laptop into a Youtube radio conductor of awesome 80s music, as usual. There are a few random videos but I'm too lazy to link them.
Some of the scenery driving out of the Keys. (I shot these when I was NOT the driver) I really love how the sandy bottom makes the water such a pretty color. On the other hand, I'm not too fond of sea grass. It's really nasty-feeling underfoot. :|
Slowmo roads
Sam took a picture of my driving. I look so serious.
And Andrew looks so chill. We had fun conversations in the car.
And this is us flying home. Thanks to Kyle, I found out about the JetBlue 10-year anniversary sale in time for us to score $20 direct flights home from Ft. Lauderdale to Austin. Our original flights from Continental would've taken us an additional 5 hours, with a layover and transfer flight in Houston. Win! Our tickets had been super cheap at the time, too, so an extra $20 wasn't a big deal.
It wouldn't be a vacation without some hamming from me
And that's Florida, folks! (There are more photos from Oliver here)
