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December 1 to 15, 2010 December 16 to 31, 2010

November 1 to 6, 2010

Between December 1st and 6th, we visit as many sights as possible in Key West without rushing.
In Key West, Duval Street is the place where everything happens. One end of the street end on the Atlantic side and the other end on the Gulf of Mexico. The following photos are from many different days.

One thing we did was to rent some bicycles and bike around Key West. The bikes are very basic. The ride is not hard, the highest elevation is only one meter above sea level. We biked around Key West, a long 17 km.

South Roosevelt Boulevard is on the Atlantic side of Key West.

In town.

Something that surprised us was the fact that Key West has very few beaches.
A few are for swimming, but most are for the sand and the suntanning.
This one is not recommended for swimming.

Don't forget, the photos are from different days.

The "Conch Tour Train" we took for the visit of the old Key West. May trains like this one offer the same service.
The guide tour was great, lots of information about the architecture and the story of Key West.

This is the end of the US-1. The US-1 started in Maine at the border with Canada and ends here some 3,825 km later.

The first photo shows you Duval Street without the cruise ship in port. The other photo shows you an unpainted house. In the old days, a house was not considered complete until it was painted. The owner was not charged the full amount for taxes. Most people did not paint their houses and saved a lot of money!

On the left, the most southern house in the US. On the right, the marker is the southern most point of the US. We are actually closer to Cuba than the continental US.

You can pretty well find anything in Key West. A back street shopping maze of an old truck that is part of a bar.

Sponge Bob?

They actually built the fence around the tree!

"The Bull" is a regular bar, but the "Whistle Bar" on the second floor is a clothing optional bar!
On the right, the smallest bar in Key West, three seats only.

A good beer in a multi-coloured bar.

Duval Street. Here you can buy a drink in a bar and half way down your drink, you can walk in the street and stop at another bar and finish you drink there.

Mallory Square is a big public place and every evening street entertainers come and entertain the tourists while waiting for the sunset.
We are on the Gulf of Mexico side of Key West.

Mallory Square in the afternoon.

By four o'clock we returned to Mallory Square for the "Sunset Celebration".
More and more people are coming for the sunset.

A few cruise ships are in. It will be crowded.

I forgot, in Key West chickens are free to roam in the city.

Many sailboat are going out to sea for the sunset.

Even a pirate ship is going out.

A juggler with two dogs, why two dogs?

Here I am at work chaining this entertainer.
He was able to break free in less than three minutes.

We want to go for a cruise for the sunset and a meal. It turns out the ship is in dry dock for inspection. The only cruise we have left is with a glass bottom and drinks. Lets go see the coral reef and the sunset.

Mallory Square from the ship.

On this side of this rocky point is the gulf of Mexico and on the other side it is the Atlantic ocean.

Our cruise.

We traveled about 15 kilometers from Key West. We can see so many fish and life form on the reef. We have less than 3 feet of water under the ship. The guide is very good.

On our way back from the coral reef, we watched the sunset with a glass of champagne. It is very pretty and surprisingly, once the sun is set, we can see a red/orange glow all around us.

From our RV park we can see the sunrise. Almost every morning we get up a 6:30 and walk about 50 feet and watch the sunrise and we are back in bed by 7:00. The sunrise are as fast as the sunset.
In no particular order.

Now the sunset. What makes them so beautiful? Maybe just knowing you are here for a short time!
As soon as the sun "touches" the ocean, it only takes a few minutes and it is gone.
In no particular order.

Good timing, on Duval Street a Santa's parade takes place tonight!

We were a little surprised to see over 15 Santas on the parade.
Some photos of our evening and the parade.

Michèle waiting for Santa!

First Santa!

second...

more...

Christmas alligator?

Hard to see, but it "snowed" in Key West tonight!

I am all happy to have seen "all" the Santas tonight.

Last day in Key West. We had a lot of wind last night. We woke up to a cloudy sky and a cold front from Canada, Only +18 C today, but we can live with that!

It is Michèle's birthday today (December 6) and since we had our last shooter with Benoit in Alberta, it is time for shooters for Michèle's birthday.

Ready...

Salt...

Tequila...

And we bite the lemon.

After the shooter, we went out for diner at the Hogfish Bar & Grill a few streets from the RV park. Mostly locals, very nice.
For diner, a JUMBO lobster BLT. Sooo good. Here is the web site for the bar.

Tomorrow we are back in Miami.

You can see all new bridges have been built and the old bridge on the side for fishing.

Between Key Largo and Homestead, just as we arrived on the continent, about 8 km, road construction and we have to move to the right and drive over big rumble strips. The motorhome vibrates, no problems. Once off the rumble strips we are still vibrating and we do not know why! We cannot pull over in the construction area. We finally made it to Homestead on the main land and we pulled over in a parking lot to check things out. As we got out of the motorhome we notice the back end is very low. OK, an airbag has blown out!
It turns out both airbags are deflated???
I look under the motorhome and see this small pipe hanging down, hummmmm!
I have this bright idea to use the motorhome jacks to "lift" the back end of the motorhome.
You can see the "nose" is super low and the "back end" high.

Evaluating the problem...

It turns out the linkage holding the airbags at the right inflation is disconnected.
Easy fix, reconnect the linkage.

With a specialized tool (screw driver) and elbow grease I reconnect the linkage and 5 minutes later it is fixed.

Denis the Super hero

Alright, back to reality, I still have to drive the motorhome to our RV park in Miami.

This little incident only added "spice" to our trip.
No more problems...

Really?

At the RV park we find out they have lost our reservation!
After some serious looking they found us a place. Good!

We are invited for diner at people we meet the last time we were here last week.
Thanks Manon and Jean for a great meal and the good times.

Wednesday December 8, 2010

Today we are on our way to the Schnebly Redland's Winery. Our friends Manon and Jean loved it so we decided to go!

What a nice place. The sad part was we could not visit the winery, but we could still visit the wine tasting area.
The wine is made from fruits and not from grapes. The fruits they use are, Avocados, Carambolas, Mangos and Guavas, really good wine, but a few were not to our liking. Of course, we made some purchases.

Christmas does have to have the Nutcrackers.

We tried twelve different wines.
The server was very good and so interesting.

As I mentioned before, irrigation system are pretty BIG in Florida.
Well, here we are going in one of the sprinkler.

A very good day. We recommend a visit at this winery.

Thursday December 9, 2010

We left Miami for our new home in Palm Beach Traveler RV Park. This campground is located about 55 km north of Fort Lauderdale.

Florida always surprises me with the different sceneries you see. Here is a dead forest in the Everglades.

Less than 50 km later, you can smell the money...

Cars, so many of them!

Our new home, Palm Beach Traveler Park.

Some photos of the campground and of our site.

Pretty campground, the people are very nice.
After we got settle in, we went for a visit at Giselle and André's place.

Friday December 10, 2010

Giselle and André invited us us to play pétanque with the people from the park. Of courses we went. Very nice afternoon playing pétanque with very nice people.

Here, I am looking at the play. My uncle, André, who won the tournament with his team.

Pretty Giselle!

After the pétanque, Giselle and André invited a few friends over for a drink before going out for supper.

After supper, André took us to a street where all the houses are decorated with Christmas lights.

What a nice day!

Saturday to Wednesday 11 to 15 of December, 2010

The following days are more relaxed. Some shopping, visiting Giselle and André and some cleaning of the basement (again).

Saturday we went shopping to two Flea Markets. One in a drive-in and the other is under the highway.
Kind of funny to hear Spanish speaking all around us. We fell like we are in another country.

Matte'Muffin breakfast.

André told us this store was full of "electronics". Well it was. WOW!

Somme more sorting/cleaning of the motorhome basement. I did well because we got two more boxes out of there. They were full of stuff we will not use in the next 9 months, so out it goes. Now I have room for a TV in the basement. I will watch it outside when it is hot. Hummm!

A very nice week, we are very happy to be stationary for the next 19 days. The routine is settling in. Every morning we play either shuffleboard or pétanque at our campground. Kind of nice because it makes you meet people.

Until next time...

Life is good!