My Day In The Gulf Of Mexico

When I booked this ferry ride I thought it included lunch and snorkeling. I didn't realize I would be gone from 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Plus we got breakfast.

I got to walk to the right of this part of the fort along Bush Key. Normally this part of the national park is closed to tourists because it is a breeding ground for sooty terns. No sooty terns are breeding yet so I had a nice walk along the key look at the sea.

I found a pretty purple sea fan.

As I walked along the beach I watched a dozen brown pelicans fly and dive into the sea with great vigor and no success. I took 16 pictures of the pelicans and when I looked, I captured zero pelicans. Photographing on my phone in bright sun light is difficult.

Hello ruddy turn stone.

Somebody made a collection of conch shells.

We left at 2:45 in order to arrive at the Key West port by 5:30. I stood out on the deck in the sun and the wind listening to 70's music over the speakers. I especially liked Come Sail Away by Styx.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dry Tortugas National Park

I drove to Kay West and took a ferry for 70 miles to the Dry Tortugas National Park. This mason fort was built during the Civil War. The most famous prisoner was Dr. Samuel Mudd. Dr. Mudd was planning to kidnap Abraham Lincoln when John Wilkes Booth impulsively decided to shoot him instead. His cell was on the second floor right above the entrance you see behind the fort sign. He helped treat patients during his stay. Prisoners were allowed free range of the island except when ferry ships came in. Then they were supposed to stay in their cells. Dr. Mudd managed to escape on a ferry but they found him again.

We were told that this fort needs work. Bricks fall to the ground on a daily basis. Some part are so dangerous guests can't enter. People can go to the second floor at their own risk.

 

Key West Lighthouse

Here is the Key West lighthouse as viewed from the grounds of the Hemingway residence.

 

Hemingway House

This morning I left Homestead and drove south on Highway 1 to Key West, Florida. The drive was pleasant. Tomorrow morning I take a ferry to I wanted to figure that out early. Here is the Ernest Hemingway house. Admission for me was $18. I took a guided tour. Key West has numerous chickens running around town.

Important people visited him like Herbert Hoover, Mark Twain, Marilyn Monroe and Truman Capote.

The grounds outside reek of cat urine.

In this portrait Hemingway (left) is portrayed older than he looks. The man on the right was the fishing captain depicted in his book The Old Man And The Sea.  I think it's a great adventure story.

When Hemingway was in Europe messing around with another woman, his wife got angry. She demolished his boxing ring and put in a swimming pool.

The wall of wives. He had four wives.

In the 1930's he acquired a white cat and named her Snowball. She had six toes. Snowball had many friends in the neighborhood. Outside are many cateries, cat nurseries, cat feeding and watering stations, and cat foot prints in cement. The outdoor grounds reeks of cat urine. Some cats are in the house but it doesn't smell as bad as the outdoors.

Hemingway had a problem with alcohol. For a year he and a buddy rented a local bar for three dollars a week. When the owner raised the rent to 4 dollars a week he got angry. He and his buddy rented another bar a half block away. If his friends brought furnishings from the old bar to the new bar they got free alcohol. When they brought the urinal from the old bar Hemingway insisted he should keep it because of all the money he pissed away in that urinal. He brought it home and put it in the yard. The wife got upset and tried to improve the appearance by putting an olive barrel on top and fancy tile across the front. Now it serves at a fountain for the cats to drink. Outside you can barely see the Key West lighthouse above the trees. Before it was easier to spot and a beacon from an inebriated Hemingway to find his way home.

He put in a walkway from his bedroom to his writing room. He suffered from insomnia and depression so he would often start typing early in the morning. He wrote 70% of his writings from this house in Key West, Florida. He caught many tarpon too. At one point his house was next to the ocean. The US Navy dredged the harbor and added a mile north and south and another mile east and west to the island that was Key West. I imagine it was charming in the 1930's. Now it is very crowded, limited parking, and very touristy. I wouldn't call Key West charming.

 

Chasing Shadows

Chasing Shadows is a historical fiction story set in the Netherlands in World War Two. The author is Lynn Austin and her story revolves around 3 women. Leda is a wife and a mother living on a farm in the countryside. Her eldest daughter, Ans, has moved to the town of Leiden after finishing school. She gets a job as an assistant to a wealthy woman and becomes good friends with a member of the police force in Leiden. Miriam is a young Jewish mother and classical violist who moves to Leiden to escape the horrors of the Nazi government in Germany. Ans gets involved in helping Jewish people hide in the Netherlands. When Miriam and her young 3 year old daughter are discovered, Ams helps them by moving the daughter to her parent's farm in the country side. The daughter grows up knowing about her mother but not remembering her at all. When at age 6 Miriam is finally able to meet her daughter again, the daughter doesn't remember her at all until she picks up the violin and plays a Brahms lullaby. Music helps the daughter and Miriam reunite. Eventually Miriam's husband joins the family on the farm as well. This was a terrific story about family, faith, and sacrifice for the sake of others.

 

Coral Castle

I visited the Coral Castle here in Homestead. If I knew admission was $28 I don't think I would have gone.

This place was build by a Latvian immigrant who was five feet four inches tall and he weighed 100 pounds. This was his bedroom up the stairs. All of his furniture (bed, chairs, dressers) was bolted to pulleys in the ceiling to make more room for him to work when he wasn't sleeping. He used only rudimentary tools such as pulleys and tripods. How did he manage to move 20 tons of coral rock with a pulley and chain designed to hold only 10 tons? No one knows. His name was Edward Leedskainin. They said he was a mathematical genius and probably on the Autism spectrum.

His tool shed was below his bedroom.

That hunk of metal in the middle there is a rear end differential for a car and served as his pressure cooker.

Edward's obelisk.

His depiction of the planets.

The entrance to his well for fresh water.

Edward craved having a wife and children but it never happened for him.

 

Black Vultures

After disembarking the Norwegian Joy, I rented a car. Never rent a car from Zazgo. What a rip off. They said I needed a loss of use clause in my car insurance policy. I called my insurance agent twice. I do have a loss of use clause but it is called something else. The guy at Zazgo refused to talk to my agent. He had no email and no fax number. I had to pay for insurance I don't need and I got a Hyundai SUV instead of the economy car I ordered. Anyway I used the car to travel from my hotel in Homestead, Florida to Biscayne National Park almost every day. I traveled through fields of palm, corn, and lettuce to get there. They have scads of black vultures here.

My first day here was warm but then the temperature dropped into the 50's. I was still wearing shorts but Floridians were wearing down jackets, wool hats, and mittens.

 

Last Day At Sea

 While at sea I enjoyed several lectures in the jewel theater. I went to a couple by a travel writer. I went to a couple given by an Italian professor. One of hers was about the native cultures in middle America and one was about chocolate. This one was given by the German Engineer (left), the Venezuelan Captain of the ship (center) and the Indian hotelier (right). The audience asked many questions and I learned very much. The ship burns diesel fuel most of the time. In some cities (like Los Angeles) they are prohibited from burning diesel and must burn marine fuel instead. The transition to sustainable fuels is going to be very expensive. The cost for the Norwegian Joy to go through the Panama Canal was 1.2 million dollars. The ship has 10,000 blue bathing towels for 5,000 guests. The people who work on the ship are assigned to stay for six months at a time. Some of the younger workers are using this opportunity to learn English. Everyone I met was pleasant. Well, the one guy at the entrance to the restaurant on the 16th deck was annoying to me. He stood there with a tambourine in his hand singing "Washy Washy!." He sang I'll be washing you to the tune of I'll be watching you. He played all kinds of songs with washy instead of the regular words. After the third day of hearing this I got annoyed and tried to avoid him. I was already going to wash my hands. I didn't need to be told over and over and over again. The ship has 3 doctors, 1 nurse, and one medical assistant on board. The HR department takes care of their employees providing room, board, uniforms, classes, and shore excursions for them. In my opinion, the people enjoyed working on this ship.

India Catalina

India Catalina was the first indigenous translator for the Spaniards. Her statues are placed around the old city. She lived from 1495 until 1538. She is the daughter of an indigenous tribal chief and she was kidnapped by the Spaniards. When movie awards are handed out in Colombia, they use her statue instead of the Oscar.

 

Columbia

Our last port visit before Miami is Cartagena, Columbia. Look at all the skyscrapers. Some are businesses and some are condos.

I was told to wait in the white duty free store but I got distracted by the wildlife outside the white building.

Two crested cara caras. This is a bird and wildlife sanctuary or maybe a zoo.

Scarlet and green macaw.

Eventually, with the help of 3 store employees, I found my way to the tour. We took a bus inside the old walled city of Cartagena. Here is the Spanish fort with cannons pointing only to the sea.

This is similar to August. The children are on summer break. The temperature was 95 degrees,

A door knocker figure of an iguana and a horse. The door is so thick no one inside could hear you rapping with your knuckles. To be allowed in you must use the door knocker.

Indigenous women pose for photos and expect tips from tourists.

A chubby female statue.

On the far end of the street you can make out the dome of Saint Peter Clavel cathedral.

Our guide suggested we rest for ten minutes because of the heat and humidity. Immediately street vendors beg you to buy things. I talked to one young fellow for 7 minutes before he realized I wasn't buying.

Immediately after he left a young woman (30's?) approached me wearing purple scrubs. I couldn't get a word of what she was saying. Suddenly she started massaging my left calf. I protested out loud and she walked away fast.

We visited an air condition emerald museum. The emeralds in Columbia are the brightest green because of the lack of iron in the rock.

St. Peter Clavel cathedral is the only church in town made entirely from stone.

Statues in St. Peter Clavel square.