The La Concha as seen from the top of the lighthouse.
We are staying in the historic district on Duval Street at the La Concha Hotel. This building is the tallest structure on Key West. Author Tennessee Williams rented out the entire top floor while he wrote A Streetcar Named Desire. The place ain’t half bad. We drop anchor and decide to head out and about. Duval Street is just a little over a mile in length and literally runs shore to shore. It and the local cross streets contain many beautiful Victorian style mansions with just a little Bahamian influence.
The Ernest Hemingway House
Ernest Hemingway resided in the stately mansion from 1931-39 and wrote To Have and Have Not while living here. The descendants of Hemingway’s famous 6 toed cats are the current residents. All of them were accounted for after the hurricane. This house sustained no damage.
Unfortunately, one well known house didn’t survive Irma.
What’s left of the Shel Silverstein house.
This is what remains of the Shel Silverstein house. The famous children’s author, cartoonist for Playboy magazine and writer of the songs: The Cover of the Rolling Stone & A Boy Named Sue used his residence here as a writing studio. Ironically, he wrote Where the Sidewalk Ends.
On Duval Street, the sidewalk ends at the famous bouy marking the southernmost point of the U.S. This fixed concrete structure that states: 90 miles to Cuba got trashed by Irma. You will note in our photo that the left side has been denuded of paint and lost so much concrete that it required an emergency patch.
90 miles to Cuba
We watched a storm move across the water while we were headed to our photo op. Just about when the shutter closed we felt the first raindrops which rapidly progressed to a torrential downpour. We had no choice but to seek shelter in a local joint. A few Margaritas and oysters later our clothes were at least dry. Our new friend and waiter, Steven, kept us laughing while we lamented the fact that we had seen nothing but rain so far.
Steven
Despite the continued threat of rain we decide to venture down to the other end of Duval where Mallory Square’s unique plaza sits on the Gulf side of the island. Mallory is famous for it’s daily Sunset Celebration. Supposedly, hundreds of tourists arrive each evening to view the sunset and be entertained by street performers and local artisans hawking their wares. Tonight it’s an empty, soggy square. Only 2 buskers are present this evening and one of them is an ex-Navy guy so we strike up a conversation with him before his show. He tells us that many of the performers have not arrived back since Irma but each night a few more of the artisans show up.
There will be no sunset to see tonight. We console ourselves with a street mojito while walking back to our hotel. This end of Duval is party central. All the bars are open and loud music spills out into the streets along with the patrons. We decide to have dinner at a famous local establishment, Caroline’s. It affords us a great street watching vantage point, solid food choices and an adjacent local marketplace whose stalls Damian finds intriguing to wander through.
Watching the ships roll in at Mallory.
Maybe the sun will come out tomorrow?
I consider sacrificing one of the many local chickens that roam the island in the hopes that it will help improve the weather.
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