Christmas Day 2016

Christmas Day

Busy day visiting, eating, chatting with a couple who literately jogged into the campground, but were staying at the Navy Lodge. They were fascinated with us staying here for the entire winter. They are thinking of going into the RV mode, but didn’t know where to start. They had looked into RV’s, but none were occupied. We gave them a tour of ours and I think they got to see how we managed the stay for the six months that we occupy this site. Just another great experience meeting people!
This noon we had lunch downtown at a Chinese restaurant. We had figured that on Christmas Day, a Chinese restaurant would be the only place open. No so, apparently most restaurants are open, but we had our tastebuds set for Chinese and so stuck to our original plan.
Key West, FL has free on street parking for the three day holiday weekend, but it isn’t to well advertised and many people pay to park. The City Parking Lots still require $20 to $30 a day parking fee. That’s why we ride bikes across town. Getting back to the Chinese restaurant, they do have free parking and we’ve always had luck in parking on their lot. The big Ford fits perfect on their corner of the lot!

Biking Challenge

If you remember reading an earlier blog, I had set a personal goal of riding 1,000 bike miles in Key West, Florida this winter! This is an update to where I’am at as of December 28, 2016. I have 618 miles to reach my challenge.

My Bird Biking Friends!

Let me explain a little about my bike and rides. I am using a mountain bike, not a road bike! The difference is the road bike weighs in around 15 pounds vs the mountain bike around 35 pounds. Hence over time, I do a mile, the road bike can do two. The difference is in the workout. I work a lot harder to get my miles than the guy on the road bike. Now, let’s talk about the actual guy on the road bike who passes me every morning like the rabbit. I being the turtle, like the old story goes. He is, I’m guessing around twenty-five years old. I being closer to 72 than 71 one makes him nearly three times younger. I watch his legs pumping at least twice as fast as mine. No problem, I’m not training for the “Tour de France”! I just want to stay in as good a shape as I can for my age.
I had a comment on Facebook the other day that my bike looked like a girls bike! Well, yes it does have a milk crate on the back. This is KW and bikes are used as a means of transportation and also to carry groceries, mail, tools, locking cables, not to mention headlights and tail lights that are stored, for security, in that milk crate. Oh yes, I did fabricate a cover for it, out of site out of mind, as well as rain protection.

The Ride!

In years past, I used to ride around the Island. It’s ten miles around, but I wasn’t really getting the exercise I wanted, because of the pedestrians, crosswalks, traffic lights and many other distractions. Last year, I elected to train with the big boys! Instead of going into town, I stayed on base and decided to cross the channel bridge over to Fleming Key and train with the US Army Special Forces Underwater Operations. Well, I don’t actually train with them, I just use the two mile, one way road to their training facility. The routine is four miles up and back three times for a 12 miles daily routine. It’s nearly every day, the exceptions are days that are above 18 to 20 knots. The wind above that is nearly impossible to conquer, that is going into the wind. The ride back is fast!

Borring? Not so!

Some might think that going back and forth along the ocean road would be very boring. “Not so”! What I imagine being boring would be going to the gym and riding a stationary bike! My usual ride happens between 6:30am and 8am. What’s so special about the time of day and the location? One big thing is the wildlife! Special, to me is the Osprey. They make their nest high on telephone poles, Florida Keys Energy, discourage this and has put up extra poles with wood skids atop. The Osprey soon pick these spots for nesting and raising

Before Sunrise Biking on Fleming Key!

their young. Now my part in all of this is when I pedal by, I’ve picked up their distinct chirps that I’ve slowly began to copy. When I ride by, I whistle these chirps and low and behold they first started to respond by looking up out of their nest. Now, I often chirp and mother or father fly along the road with me until I’m a distance from the homestead. I wish I could video this, but unless I get a GoPro video camera mounted on my helmet that isn’t going to happen.
Other birds that I watch and who watch me are Turkey Vultures, Pelicans, White Heron, Great Egret, Anhinga (snakebird). In mid November, the Turkey Vultures and the Black Vultures show up in the Keys by the thousands. They are migrating back to South America. By the end of the month, the migration has waited for the right wind direction to continue their flight to the south across the Gulf of Mexico. A very few of these Vultures stay behind in Key West. Local folklore says that when the Turkey Vultures leave the Keys the Hurricane season in unofficially over!
Another asset to biking on Fleming Key is the Ocean. Somedays the water is flat and calm, other days the waves are choppy, but unlike the ocean along the coast no continuous wave action along the breakwaters. No loud roar of the powerful ocean like on the East or Western seaboard.
In this time of the year, sunrise around 7:30am. I’m often on the road by than. I have a super powerful USB rechargeable bike flashlight along with two red taillights. One of them being mounted on my helmet and the other below the seat. In dawns early light, it’s cool to be biking up Fleming. By the time I reach my first two mile turn around the sun is lining the distant clouds that always seem to surround islands during the night. The clouds might be caused by the island warm landmass and the cooler ocean water condensing around the Coral reef. I remember watching old John Wayne movies filmed in the South Pacific with these similar clouds present offshore. Back to the sunrise! The sun breaks above these low clouds and magical beauty and warmth appears instantly.
Maybe I’ll continue with more of my biking memories in the next blog!

That is what we saw and did!

Retired ~ With No Time Off!

December 18, 2016

I’ve been slacking in my blog writing! I really enjoy documenting what we’ve been doing down here in the tropics, but I can’t believe how busy life has become. Week after week, one activity after another…it never seems to end.

Electrician's Christmas!

One of my longest parts of writing is working in the pictures of all of the activities. I’ve been taking hundreds of pics and someday, when I really retire, I’ll have to do something with those thousands of pictures I’ve taken and collected through the years. If anything else, I enjoy flipping the pages and recalling the fond memories!
In order to write more often, I will reduce the number of photos. I realize that pictures play an important part of telling a story. Maybe things will slow down and the pictures will flow back in.

Christmas Week

With Christmas coming up next weekend, the campground has been bustling. A couple of days ago, I helped our two camp-host Jan and Sabrina setup a real Christmas tree at the entrance to the

Christmas at Western Union Wharf

campground. Last night, the campers, brought food dishes at the pavilion for a good festive meal. This was followed by decorating the Christmas tree and finally a tree lighting ceremony just after dark. There are a handful of kids in the campground (active duty families) who got a thrill with the Christmas Tree lighting!

Key West Holiday Lights!

It is strange for a northerner to come to a warm climate at Christmas time. Back home, everybody decorates with lights in windows and a few brave souls who venture out and hang lights on the outsides of their homes. I remember driving around town, Christmas week, at night, with the family, looking at all the lit decorations, in the different neighborhoods.

2nd Place Christmas Light Contest Winner...Our Favorite!

Jump down here in the Keys and it is a little different. Homes are covered with lights! That maybe expected, but what is unusual, for me, is having the home owners sitting outside and wishing passerby's a Merry Christmas. Background music playing Christmas Carols! All of this, with an outside evening temperature of around 74 degrees, which makes these outings very pleasant.

That is what we saw and did!

Social Life in the Keys

Veterans Day November 11, 2016

We’ve been in Key West for approximately a month and a few days. It is a magical place to meet people. It’s like migrating birds that come from all over the country on a migration. The birds migrate further south into Central and South America. We humans, are tethered to the earth for the most part and wind up here at the end of the road on US 1 mile marker zero! The neat thing is that most of us didn’t know each other before this migration south. The nesting place, for us is Trumbo Point. We all park our campers here, close to one another, set up our little home away from home compounds and then start to notice our neighbors. A friendly, hi, hello, how are you doing and next thing, we have new friends! We all have different stories, different places of origins but the common bond is that we all, or at least half of the spouses, served in the military. This is what makes us nearly family.
When I was in the Army their seemed to always be a rivalry between all branches of service. That doesn’t exist here! We are all “US Retired Military”. It doesn’t matter if we were privates or generals, we are retired military! Key West stands out as a military town that dates back well before the Civil War. The local economy does depend on tourist, but it also depends heavily on military and their dependents. A perfect example of this was November 11th, Veterans Day. It is without hesitation that I say that this was the finest military parade that I’ve seen! I was really impressed with the number of military personnel in the parade. We, here at Trumbo Point Campground, even had a float in the parade!
The parade naturally march down Duval Street. Key West has a beautiful monument park. On Veterans Day our fallen comrades were remembered at Bayview Park. The parade didn’t come close to Bayview, but flowers adored the memorial. After the parade we rode our bikes on the back streets to Bayview. A tour bus had just dropped tourist. Many of these were veterans who looked at the inspiring plaques with engraved scenes from all of the wars. I asked one vet, looking at the Vietnam plaque, “Where were you stationed?” He replied, “up north” another here in Bien Huh. We remembered many things from our active military careers.

Daily Routine

We have pretty much settled into daily routine now.

• Early risers around 6:15am (Later than the 5:15am back home in NH)
• Shower
• Breakfast around 7:30am
• Exercise (Helen walks with one or two girls…3 to 4-1/2 miles) I ride my bike on Fleming Key 12 miles…gold for this year is 1,000 miles…840 left to go.
• Coffee break around 9:30 am
• Depending on which day of the week it’s Bocce Mondays and Fridays 10am to 12noon Tuesday and Thursday our Tai Chi classes at 11:30 am
• Most everyday we bike to these classes and games. From the classes and/or game we bike another couple of miles to check our mailbox down on Whitehead Street.
• Afternoon are reserved for groceries or anything that needs to be done.
• Normally we eat at home in the evening, except for Friday nights when we make it a point to go out to a restaurant and reflect on the pass week.

Volunteering

If there is one thing that you can do as much as you want in Key West is volunteering! Every single day there is another type of activity, parade, marathon. You name it and Key West has it! All this leads to the need for volunteers.
Last week our latest volunteerism was the Key West Film Festival. Another free tee shirt to add to our collection. It is interesting and fun to do these events, we see and meet lots of people, both participants and spectators.

That is what we saw and did!

ROTC Cadets!

Trumbo Point ...Our Float!

KW was a Sub Base in "Years Pass"

Looking Sharp US Navy