Early to bed and Early to rise….gets my ass to Key Largo
before dark. Seriously, that was the
whole plan for today. Haul ass down the
length of Florida, check on the truck and trailer at the Miami airport ( I dropped it off a couple of weeks before) and roll onto Key Largo while singing
Bertie Higgins (don’t fight it, it’s good for you.)
First off, I roll all the way down to Florida to freeze my
ass off. Seriously, it had to be in the
upper 40’s when I woke up at 5. Full
winter gear and long underwear just barely cut the bite of the wind. The first hour was pretty rough.
I think I stopped in Crystal River to get breakfast and
coffee. At this point things were
warming up and I was starting to relax.
I was kind of looking forward to Tampa.
Out of all the routes I took on this trip, this was the one I
spent the most time planning. I wanted
to stay close to the coast but that route added hours to the trip. I wish I would have had another day to get a
feel for this part of Florida. I am
pretty sure I could live down here.
Instead I took 19 all the way down through Tampa to save
time. My phone was trying to
get me killed. The navigation would work for 5 minutes at a time and then the
phone would shut down…just before I passed a ramp with no signs. So, I got a little lost in Tampa and ended up at the Shriner's International Headquarters. I’ve already written another post about this one so I’ll just say that I am really glad I got lost. It was a high point of the trip and I’ll
remember it for the rest of my life.
South of Tampa, I crossed this big beautiful bridge:
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| The Bob Graham Sunshine Skyway Bridge |
About half way across the bridge I realized that it was no
longer cold. It was, in fact, really
hot. It would stay that way for the rest
of the trip.
I stopped on the other side of the bridge to ditch the winter
gear and get some coffee. I struck up a conversation with a very much older guy
(70’s) on a small Honda Shadow. We
talked about fuel efficiency and lifetimes of riding. He was on a tour of the south, moving from
couch to couch, visiting relatives. In
one of the recent Carl Hiassen books (read him, he’s fucking great),
there is a retired cop who spends his time riding his Harley up and down
Florida. That is literally his
retirement life. I ran into many people
who I thought might be living this way.
You could get used to it.
In any case, I got turned around and headed back the wrong
way over the bridge. I stopped again to take pictures.
Then I set out to make some time. I didn’t really mind repeating this bridge,
it is breathtaking, even the third time ‘round.
Not much to see or say about the next few hundred miles. Mostly just turnpike. I enjoyed the speed though. It felt good to open ‘er up and just cruise
for a few hours. Then it was time to
turn east across Florida. It was
basically just swamp and brushlands all the way across the state.
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| Credit: Google Maps |
Guess what, I got lost in Miami. Really goddamned lost. Then a miracle
occurred. My phone turned out to be a
game-day player. The turn-by-turn got me
to the airport! A quick word about Miami. Felt a lot like home (Houston). Warm
and busy. Vibrant and cramped but in a good way. I feel comfortable there.
After a couple of hours in the traffic I was headed down the
turnpike to Key Largo. Key Largo is not
what I expected. It isn’t particularly
beautiful and there is just enough development to kill some of the natural
beauty of the island. It wasn't all bad though.
My campsite, however, was terrible.
Dark and tiny with no view of anything but the Poisonwood forest between
me and the bay. I should have said hell
with it and stayed in a hotel.
In any case, I got unpacked and set up camp. I crashed out
pretty early because I was so damned tired from the ride.
At some point around midnight, I heard a bell ringing outside
my tent. Apparently one of the local
boys (probably a raccoon) found the package of week-old hot dogs in my fishing kit and was
dragging the whole damn thing off into the woods. I was too tired to care and
went back to sleep.
