Why Key West?
I naturally gravitate to the mountains of the West. I need them. I need to get next to them, to be amongst them, and preferably, to be on top of them. I cannot stay away from them for more than a couple of years at a time. But, after 2000's pilgrimage to Sturgis, and 2001's trip to Colorado and Utah, I wanted to go somewhere different. The summer's one-day jaunt to Chicago and back can be partially explained by this yearning for something different.

For several years, the image of riding across Florida Keys has grown im my mind. This image has always struck me to be the epitome of motorcycle riding - with the the clear, bright, sunlit blue skies above, the deeper blue seas on either side of a shimmering-silver-ribbon-of-a-bridge connecting a string of isolated islets that extends seemingly forever, into the horizon.

That's the image. Reality differs.

Knowing that, unlike the IronButt ride earlier in the summer, this would not be a one-day trip, I did not leave Kansas City until after 8:00 AM. I had abandoned the notion of travelling with nothing but an overnight bag sitting on the seat behind me. This trip would be longer than any other I had taken. The need to take more stuff required another, larger bag to be connected to the overnight bag with D-rings, then strapped with bungies, to keep the works off of my recently, and expensively, replaced rear fender. Getting all this properly rigged required sunlight. As the trip wore on, I got progressively better at this rigging -- up to a point.

On previous trips, I had prided myself on being able to travel ultra-light. All I needed was an extra pair of jeans, socks, underwear, and a T-shirt or two. I had to do laundry nearly everyday, but I had developed a riding style, beginning with the Sturgis trip, that accomodated that need. The best riding is the early morning hours--less traffic, better weather. So, I'd start riding at 7:00 or 7:30 AM and ride until 3:30 or 4:00 PM, then catch a quick nap after doing the day's laundry at a motel; then take another short ride before retiring for the evening. But, I was going to need things in Key West, Florida, not needed in Custer, South Dakota. These items included walking shorts, tennis shoes, swimming trunks and a beach towel. This, plus the fact that I had had an unpleasant experience on my way back from the Canyonlands -- that involved my denim jacket, a container of suntan lotion, I-70 and a semi -- that told me that I didn't want to rely on simply tying the jacket down with a bungie, on top of the overnight bag. Hence the larger bag. For the most part, the big bag held my clothes, maps, etc., and the overnight bag was used primarily for my rain gear, jacket and helmet (when I wasn't forced by law to wear the thing).

The trip down to the Keys was going to take three days and change. I had already planned the stops, based on a motorcycle truism once expressed by a friend of mine who said that no one should have to ride more than 500 miles in any given day. That would mean stopping in Clarksville, TN, Valdosta, GA and Homestead, FL That would leave a short 125 mile hop into Key West -- and allow a leisurely, yet triumphant passage across the Keys in the brilliant, glorious morning sunshine. Again -- that was the plan. I hadn't as yet finalized my plans for the return trip. All I really knew was that I was going to stay in Key West for three nights, ride back up the Florida coast to Daytona Beach, then come back to K.C. through New Orleans. I hate to backtrack on a long trip, and a sidetrip to New Orleans would only add 400 or so miles. It promised to be well worth that much.

The first day was nearly perfect. Somewhere around Columbia, MO, I began to comprehend just how long this trip was going to be. I had casually thrown around 4,000 miles to friends as a ballpark figure, but I had no appreciation of just how far that really was. Now after about 100 miles, I had covered about 2.5% of the overall roundtrip distance. Ouch.

Last Bike to Clarksville
The first leg of the trip went smoothly. The bike was running fine as it passed the 40,000 mile mark at Lake St. Louis on I-70, 40 miles or so short of the city of St. Louis. Being a Saturday morning I wasn't expecting traffic into St. Louis to be quite so heavy. Or so fast. It was a bit tricky, as road construction was predominent from the airport into town. I was doing my best to keep up with traffic and follow the lane changes as dictated by the orange barrels. The only bike I remember was a lady on a Sportster. She seemed to be in fine trim, but that damn full-face mask prevented a good look-see. She never even turned her head. They never do.

I didn't stop for gas in the St. Louis area, but kept on going until I was 50 or 60 miles out of town on I-64. By the time I stopped for a breather it was pretty damn hot. Hot enough that I took off my denim jacket and replaced my helmet with my trusty bandana. I wouldn't need the helmet again until Tennessee.

As I rode along I-57 south towards the Kentucky line, I was struck by the change in the terrain along the Interstate. The plains of Missouri and Western Illinois had been gradually replaced with the remnants of a great coniferous forest that stretched along the roadside for miles on end. This tree-lined highway was a pleasant change from sometimes barren openness that I usually ride.

Just south of Marion, I turned onto I-24 and headed for the Ohio River. I was impressed. This portion of the Ohio compares to the Mississippi in terms of breadth and grandeur. The Tennessee River is no mean tributary itself. Of couse, the billions of federal dollars poured into the Tennessee Valley Authority created some of largest man-made waterway's in the world -- including Lake Kentucky, with its 2,400 miles of shoreline. In general, though Western Kentucky seemed a bit more rocky than Southern Illinois. Maybe it was just that the road conditions worsened a bit.

As I approached my first scheduled stop in Clarksville, TN, I pulled in for gas while still in Kentucky. After a brief respite, and a couple of requisite Snickers, I put the damn helmet back on and headed out down Alt U.S. 41 towards Clarksville. I figured I could save a couple of bucks on a motel by getting off of the Interstate. What I hadn't figured on though, was Clarksville's proximity to Ft. Campbell, KY - Home of the 101st Airborne. This means that the motels in Clarksville cater to off-duty military-types who have nothing better to do than to prove, over and over, what great killing machines they have been trained to be. This proof of manhood naturally takes the form of boozing, whoring and generally carrying on. As a rule, they are not particular in what fleabag of a motel this activity takes place. Unfortunately, I was too tired to care at this point, so after refusing the first room assigned to me because of a combination of heat and non-functioning A/C, I settled into the second one that was nearly as bad, but was at least on the shady side of the building.

All that remained of the first day, was a bland Mexican meal served by recent immigrants from that land South of the Border who were just as hospitable as you could ask for. But there was something apologetic in their demeanor, as though they were saying how sorry they were for serving these unreasonble facsimiles of the tasty dishes of their native country. They seemed to be saying of the local Anglo popoulation, "This is how they like it." It was not how I like it, but of course I couldn't insult my hosts' graciousness.

Lord, I Was Born a Ramblin' Man....
The second day of the journey started with a great deal of promise. It was a bright sunlit Sunday morning that began with a cold mocha and a very pleasant cool ride along the Cumberland River. The road was smooth, wide and empty, and as I skirted the edge of town I cranked on it just a bit. But I got this funny feeling, so I backed off as I approached an intersection. Sure enough, there sat Rufus T. Deputy, guarding the periphery of Clarksville, Tennessee. I had avoided a citation, but Rufus decided that I merited an escort to the Interstate several miles down the line. I left Rufus and Clarksville behind as I clambered back on to I-24 bound for Nashville.

I continued on my way across middle Tennessee cruising along I-24. The obvious problem with Interstate travel is that you only get to see that portion of the land immediately adjacent to the Slab. No real feel or appreciation for the nuances of any locality is possible. Yet at times one gets the feeling that a place possesses certain hidden charms, not obvious to the casual and fleeting traveller. This was the feeling that I got for Tennessee, especially as I approached the hill country below Nashville. But alas, exploration of the byways of southern Tennessee will need to wait for another day.

Nashville presented itself as a rather handsome, modern city, or at least that's the impression I took from the "Nashville Skyline" as viewed from I-24. As the road continued across Tennessee I had the inescapable feeling that I was continually descending as I approched the Georgia border. A check of elevations in a national gazeteer shows that this is not the case. I still don't know to what phenomenon I might ascribe this "descent", as I was not suffering from acute "white line fever" or any of the related maladies. I was only on Day Two, after all. The feeling persisted all the way to Chattanooga, though.

I said farewell to I-24 at Chattanooga and hello to I-75. This was a major change in the pace of things. While I-24 is a thoroughly modern, moderately busy U.S. Interstate, it seems a backwater alleyway in comparison to I-75. The good thing about I-75 was the three-lanes flowing in either direction; the bad thing was the heavy traffic that flew along 15 mph above the posted limit. That's not even taking the "Road Gators" into consideration.

Road Gators...
That's what the locals call the many blown tire treads that populate the roads in Georgia in numbers that astound. Granted, I first spotted the increase in their numbers as I approached Chattanooga, they "were fruitful, and multiplied manyfold" across the border into Georgia. When you're on a motorcycle, these dangerous critters can kill the unsuspecting rider in a heartbeat and are a constant threat everywhere. Just what causes them to so heavily populate the Peach State remains a mystery.

According to the 500-mile-per-day-plan, my next scheduled stop was to be Valdosta, GA. Since this was Sunday, and more importantly, opening Sunday of the 2002 NFL season, I was hoping to make the next stop in time for the Broncos game against St. Louis. It was scheduled as the nationally televised second game on CBS. I should have had time, but I apparently forgot about the time change from Central to Eastern. As game time approached, I was wearing down, and decided to bag it at Lenox, GA. It was only after checking in a rather rundown motel that I found that the locally-televised game (Atlanta vs Green Bay) had gone into OT. So I missed the entire 1st Quarter of the Bronco game anyway. As it turned out, the Broncos beat the Rams 23-16, but only after Mike Shanahan threatened to bench starting quarterback Brian Griese. (As the season played itself out, that might have been a Good Thing!)

Rollin' down Highway 41
Well my father was a gambler down in Georgia,
He wound up on the wrong end of a gun.
And I was born in the back seat of a Greyhound bus
Rollin' down Highway 41.
--Dickie Betts

Though I had traded in I-24 for I-75 at Chattanooga, I was still riding alongside U.S. Highway 41. My stop at Lenox provided me an opportunity to ride down this venerable Southern artery down to Sparks, GA, where I passed the 1,000 mile point of my trip looking for some dinner. I felt right at home when I found a much loved Popeye's Chicken just down the road in Adel, GA.

Mainline Florida
The next day's ride would take me down the center of the Florida peninsula, but first I had to survive the ride out of Georgia.

As much as motorcycle riders appreciate a good smooth surface on which to ride, the uneven lanes created during the construction of those smooth lanes are flat out dangerous. Simply changing lanes from the lower to upper lane can be tricky. Since bridges are generally exempt from uneven lanes, they provide an opportunity to change lanes safely. That is, unless the Georgia Highway Department has decided to end the right lane of a three-lane portion of I-75 at the very edge of the bridge you had picked out to use to change lanes, and the 18-wheeler next to you in the middle (soon-to-be-right) lane shows no indication of slowing down (and thereby allowing you to live). My only recourse was to throttle up in front of the semi, bank left - bouncing quickly up over the uneven lane and avoiding the abutment standing where my lane had just been before. It's one of those happens-so-fast-that-it surprises-the-hell-out-of-you things, but you have to maintain control.

The rest of the day was less eventful...for the most part.

The morning was hazy, then downright foggy. The morning sunlight barely penetrated the fog. I had noticed the ground had become more sandy as I progressed towards the Florida-Georgia border, but I was somehow surprised at the first palm tree by the side of the road. The first ones seemed a bit scrawny, but their relative stature increased as I rode along.

After crossing into Florida, I stopped at a Tourist Information Center for some unknown reason. Maybe I just wanted to get out of the fog. I guess I figured that a tourist Mecca like Florida would have something worthwhile at a Tourist Center. I was mistaken. I had plans to pick some Tupelo honey in the Panhandle on my way home, and I wanted to see if the folks at the Info Center had any special insight into honey production in Florida. But the gray-haired lady I spoke with knew little about honey aside from the variety made using the nectar produced from orange blossoms.

So onward I rode down I-75. I had decided to abandon the Interstate in favor of U.S Highway 27 for the day's journey. Highway 27 runs down the length of the of Florida from near Gainesville to Miami, passing through the center of the penninsula. I was heading toward Homestead and U.S. 27 seemed like a pleasant alternative to the SuperSlab at this point. I got a bit impatient though and cut over to 27 prematurely, at Lady Lake. As a result I had traffic lights for the next 15-20 miles. I should have waited to take the Florida Turnpike towards Orlando, then jump off at 27 going South. Oh well.

Just a few miles south of the Florida Turnpike, I spotted what turned out to be the Florida Citrus Tower. It's a 226-foot tower-like structure, complete with requisite restaurant at the top. I'll admit at the time I was puzzled. Here we are in the very center of a mostly flat area in Florida -- what is there to see? Built in 1956 at the highest point in Florida (500ft), it was a major tourist attraction. Apparently, the idea was to allow visitors to observe the surrounding orange groves. Hmmm...OK?

U.S. 27 continues south through the central Florida lake district, skirting the Lakewood-Winter Haven-Cypress Gardens area. I even rode passed Baseball City, which though I didn't realize it at the time, was the K.C. Royals spring training facility. It looked like a nice park, but not much else around. In fact, it closed shortly after I rode by (Sep 2002), and it was replaced by yet another strip mall.

By the time I rode into Sebring, I noticed several things. The weather had been very coopertive up until this point, but the afternoon clouds threatened rain. Also, I had ridden just about 1300 miles in less than three days and I was getting a little "road happy". Sebring, I decided was the Crown Victoria Capital of the World. It seemed like every other car in town was a blue-haired old lady putting around in a Crown Vic or Grand Marquis. I drove right by the Ford-Mercury dealer and he looked to be doing a brisk business. Even the non-Ford dealers had used car lot after lot filled with large Fords and Mercs.

Anyway, the rain came, but as usual by the time I stopped and got my rain gear on, it had stopped raining. I didn't get more than three blocks down the road and had to stop again and take the rain gear off. It's a good thing I did. As I said, I was starting to show signs of road fatigue. When I stopped to remove my rain gear, I noticed that I had left a bungee cord dangling. Not a good sign. It really could have been a bad thing. I had about 180 miles to go before reaching my goal of Homestead and was making mistakes already. It would get worse later.

I continued down the road, telling myself to be more careful, but still determined to make it to Homestead. About 40-45 miles further along, I realized that I had been baking in the Florida sun and was getting dehydrated. It had been a hot ride all along, but the humidty was sweating me pretty good by now. The terrain was flat. It was not quite a swamp, but on its way to becoming one. I passed by what appeared to be a cantina of sorts, but quickly changed my mind and rode back to it. I had brought the bike to a halt atop a small knoll without realizing it, so that the ground broke away from the bike quickly enough that the kickstand didn't immediately touch ground. As a result, the bike dropped. It dropped slowly and I thought that I could stop it going all the way to the ground. I was wrong. I caught the bike in time, but I was just too weak to keep it up. I got it back up, went into the cantina/store and got something to drink. I slammed it down pretty quickly and got back on the bike.

The highway now deviated from its previous North-to-South orientation and veered left towards the southeastern shore of Lake Okeechobee. I now made yet another stop - my third in the last 75-80 miles. I thought I was in Belle Glade, but it was in fact South Bay, Florida. Again, I felt the need for more liquid refresher, so I downed a pink lemonade in short order. As I leaned on the bike at the edge of gas station, an ambulance screamed towards me from the cross street (West Palm Beach Rd.) The driver seemed to struggle with the heavy vehicle and nearly ran me over as he lumbered around the corner. The siren was deafening.

I finished my drink, then continued on, following the path taken by the ambulance, not really thinking about it. Just a three or four miles further all traffic stopped. There had been a bad accident. So I waited.

There were quite a few vehicles between me and the accident site. The drivers of several of these decided that it would be possible to drive around the accident and continue down U.S. 27. By now, we were surrounded by canals and swampland. A detour seemed unlikely, but I followed them anyway, hoping they knew just where they were going. We went back north up 27, then east over a canal, then back south, then west. The detour covered 8-10 miles. In the end, we arrived back at the same intersection -- which was still blocked by the accident -- from another direction. Apparently, the accident was a particularly nasty T-collision involving a semi-trailer truck and a passenger car. The only way around involved detouring 40 miles over to West Palm Beach. So I waited.

And I waited. I shut the bike off and watched as a very low, large and extremely black cloud scudded directly overhead and dumped massive amounts of rain down upon me. I had just enough time to get my rain gear on, then it just poured. No real lightning, but thousands of gallons of cool, very wet water. As we waited, a large helicopter arrived. It took ten or fifteen minutes for the chopper to be loaded and take off. This thing was surprisingly large. Much larger than a Huey, but it was not a Sea King or Blackhawk. I think it may have been an old Sikorsky S-62. Anyway, the roadway was finally cleared. And the ride continued south down U.S. 27.

Within a few miles, the weather cleared up and the road dried up enough for me to remove the rain gear. The rain had cooled me off, so the remaining 90 or so miles passed by uneventfully. There was no mistaking just where I was now -- in the "Glades" for sure... This was some of the most isolated roadway I've ever been on. It was a nice, smooth four-lane divided highway with little traffic, mostly trucks. There were some small trees and other vegetation, mostly on the east side of the roadway. And pretty much nothing else...only the companion high-power lines that at times ran along both sides of the road. Everything else was swamp.

I rode on through the Everglades, crossing under I-75 (Alligator Alley). Soon thereafter hints of civilization started to appear. To the east, at times small clusters of houses could be seen in the distance. Further along there was a couple of small farms/ranches complete with livestock. Further still were a few commercial facilities of some sort. Finally, I said farewell to U.S. 27 as I made a right turn on State Road 997, also known as Krome Avenue, which bypasses Miami and continues until intersecting with U.S. 1 just south of Homestead at Florida City. It's about 40 miles long and consists of wooded areas mixed with some surburban neighborhoods and plant nurseries.

The highlight was a fairly massive facility that I took to be a federal prison. It turned out to be a former U.S. Air Force Nike missle base that was subsequently used by the Immigration and Naturalization Service as the Krome Detention Center, used for some Cuban, but primarily Haitian refugees in the 1980's. The INS was still running the Center when I passed it in 2002. It has since been re-designated by the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement division as the Krome Service Processing Center and "is a temporary detention center for individuals who are waiting for their immigration status to be determined or who are awaiting repatriation."

Soon the traces of civilization became more and more evident. Before long I was again in the midst of modern industrial society. Traffic increased, farms and even housing developments sprang up. Before I knew it, I was checking into a motel in Florida City, then headed back up to Homestead for a meal. Once again I had Mexican food. While waiting for my food I began to notice something. The people on the streets of Homestead were a curious ethnic admixture of Hispanic -- Cuban, Mexican, and other Central Americans -- White, and Haitian. So I was not suprised that unlike the tasteless food served two days ago in Tennesee, this was much zestier, heartier variety of Mexican food. That's certainly one benefit of a multi-cultural society.

Highway to the Keys
So it had come to this. After three days and nearly 1500 miles, I was finally on the verge of my glorious ride out over the ocean to the beautiful, sunny Florida Keys.

As I said, reality differs.

As always, I was up early and ready to ride. By the time I got on the road, the sky was lightening enough to see, but no sun appeared. Directly overhead was partly cloudy, but dark clouds were already massing to the southwest. U.S. Highway 1 drops SSE out of Florida City for about 20 miles, when it turns abruptly to the right, heading southwest to Key Largo. From Florida City to Key Largo - known as the "18 Mile Stretch" - is one of the deadliest, creepiest roads on the planet. Within the first 5-7 miles, I knew I was in for it. (The 18 Mile Stretch has since been given a $300 million overhaul and is no longer such the menace it was in 2002)

First, it grew darker. Then the rains came. I had been hoping that I would be able to stop and don my helmet and rain gear, if needed, but the torrents came too quickly for that. The highway was a narrow two-lane with even narrower shoulders. At this point there was little or no traffic, but with only dirt/gravel side roads and turnouts, I didn't feel safe stopping in near-total darkness. So on I rode.

The rain just kept coming harder. It was coming down so hard that it wasn't draining off the road. I began to worry about hydroplaning, so I slowed down. Just then a medium-sized box truck came up from behind me. When he passed, I nearly lost it. The water from his wash nearly swamped me. I immediately eased off the throttle and regained control. There was nothing I could do, but soldier on. About this time I could just about make out some blue sky ahead, but it seemed to never get closer.

By the time I stopped in Key Largo, I was drenched. My clothes weighed a ton. I literally felt as though I had just crawled out of a swimming pool. But there really wasn't anything I could do, except get back on the bike and keep going. It was light now and the rain had gone, so I rode along drying in the wind.

As I rode through Key Largo, I was impressed with the palm trees lining both sides of the highway. Something though, made me feel a bit uneasy. I just couldn't put my finger on the reason. It slowly dawned on me that I'd seen this road before. I vaguely remembered seeing waves crashing through those palms! At first, I thought it was from the hurricane scenes in the Humphrey Bogart - Edward G. Robinson movie "Key Largo", but later realized that it was from a docmumentary on the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. Just visualizing those waves crashing through the trees brought home the fact that I was riding out into the Atlantic Ocean on a chain of more than 1700 tiny narrow islands (called keys) to a point more than 115 miles from the mainland.

Known as the "Overseas Highway", the stretch of U.S Highway 1 runs 127.5 miles from Florida City to Key West. Originally built as the "Overseas Railroad", an extension of the Florida East Coast Railway down to Key West completed in 1912. After the railway was mostly destroyed by the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935, the roadbed was sold to the state of Florida and used for U.S. Route 1. Relative locations along this route are denoted by a system of Mile Markers (MM), beginning at the junction of the Florida Turnpike and U.S. 1 (127.5) and ending near the Court House Square in Key West (0). So, a Mile Marker with a given number is that number of miles from Key West. Even street addresses along the U.S. 1 (outside of Marathon and Key West) are based on the Mile Markers, so that a building between Mile Markers 88 and 89 might have an address of 88650. The "18 Mile Stretch" runs from 126.0 to about 107.2.

Connecting the numerous keys along U.S. 1 are a series of 42 bridges - ranging from 140 feet to over 6.75 miles in length, totalling nearly 18.9 miles. These are what I had ridden 1500 miles to see. I knew about the Seven Mile Bridge and I longed to ride it - with the sun glinting across the ocean and nothing else in sight to clutter the mind - a singularity of man/road/machine.

Once again, reality differs...
I had started the process of drying in the wind as I slowly progressed down the Keys. The speed limit on the Upper Keys and Middle Keys hovered around 45 mph as I passed through a series of towns and villages. But, I was in no hurry as my mileage quota for the day was about one-forth of my normal day's travel. It was now full-on daytime. The clouds were thick and steel-gray -- even the ocean was a dull metallic color. This was not the shimmering-silver-ribbon-sun-in-your-face passage that I had envisioned.

Which is not to say that I didn't enjoy the bridges and the ride. I did - but with dampened spirits - and seriously wet clothes.

Though the Seven Mile Bridge was a definite experience, the much shorter and newer Bahia Honda Bridge was more enjoyable. The Seven Mile Bridge is two-lane and I had to focus a bit more and not let my eyes -- or mind -- wander too much, though traffic was pretty light. The Bahia Honda Bridge, only about 1.25 miles long, but was a four-lane and rose higher over the ocean. It's actually two bridges, side-by-side, with each having two lanes moving in the same direction.

Eventually, I crossed all the bridges and rode into Key West. I quickly located my motel and got checked in.

Wastin' Away in Margaritaville
The original plan was to hang out in Key West for only a couple of days, then start the trip back to KC by way of Daytona, Pensacola and New Orleans. Tropical Storm Hanna decided otherwise.

My first day in Key West consisted of walking the short distance from my motel to Duvall Street and its environs. Duvall St. is party central in Key West. The cruise ships pull up to the piers located at one end of Duvall, and the passengers disembark, pouring along Duvall and and its myriad of bars, eateries and the like -- ranging from Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville to Clint Eastwood's Hogs Breath Inn, which is less than a block from Duvall St.

I had lashed my bike to a telephone pole across from the motel. The short distances involved in Key West -- and the fact that I had just ridden 1564 miles in three and a half days -- rendered riding rather unappealing for the time being. So I simply ambled about the old section of Key West for a couple of hours, then returned exhausted to the motel and slept the sleep of the dead. I awoke the next morning to a report on ABC's Good Morning America about violent storms in the Florida Keys and a video of spectacular lightning displays at Key Largo -- where I had been drenched only 24 hours earlier. At least I had been spared the lightning.

It was now September 11, 2002 -- the first anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington. The nation was on edge. There was a panic in South Florida as a group of "Arab-looking" students were supposedly overheard making "threats" in a restaurant. Apparently, they ducked through a turnpike turnstile, probably trying to get the heck out of harm's way as quickly as possible. It all came to naught, of course, but the press played it up and the local populace ate it up. I, on the other hand, decided it was a good time to take a short ride.

As I mentioned, the ride in from Homestead was anything but the sun-drenched experience I had envisioned. This day, however was bright and sunny, so I decided to ride back the 50 miles to Marathon and to re-ride the Seven Mile and the Bahia Honda Bridges. It was definitely worth the two-hour trip. Although it was much more enjoyable the second time, this trip was perhaps more noteworthy for the fact in the ride to Marathon -- only 50 or so miles -- I saw eleven law enforcement vehicles, mostly from Monroe County Sheriff's Office. I don't remember seeing any at all the day before. 9/11 jitters, I guess.

Upon my return to Key West, I was welcomed by some idiot kid in a Mustang who decided he wanted to occupy the same space in my lane -- that I was occupying at the time. As any good physicist will tell you, that is impossible. But rather than lecture the moron on the nuances of space/time, I dodged out of the way as quickly as possible and gladly parked the bike and re-lashed it to the telephone pole, where it stayed, with only minor exceptions, for the next several days across from my motel.

Now I turned my attention over to doing touristy stuff, some of which was good fun -- including para-sailing and scuba lessons. The para-sailing was pretty cool -- tethered on a 200-foot rope, sailing effortlessly in the blue skies above aqua seas, where I was joined in flight by a pair of F-18 fighters from the Key West Naval Air Station. The scuba lessons were less successful. The initial familiarization lesson was in a hotel pool, that, for a reason I couldn't figure at the time, was only four feet deep. My instructor, an early-twenties sweetie, spent most of her attention on the middle-class couple who must have been a better bet for a large tip. Anyway, we were scheduled to take a boat that afternoon offshore a ways for deeper water, but I cancelled. The storms had churned up the surf and rendered the normally clear waters rather murky. That, plus the fact that I really wasn't getting the whole scuba-concept-thing anyway. I guess it came down to the fact that I just didn't feel like going under that much water.

So I skipped the scuba and spent the afternoon exploring Key West a bit more -- after doing some laundry, that is. I took a circuitous route down to Duvall Street, snooping around the old side of Key West. I passed a plaque that marked the highest point on the island - 13 feet!! I suddenly felt a bit exposed, 125 miles from the mainland. I walked through an old cemetery where the dead aren't buried, but encased in catafalques and mausoleums. Oh, I get it -- that's why the hotel pool was only four feet deep -- any deeper and it would have been ocean water! One unexpected sight was the USS Maine Memorial, where bodies of dead sailors from the Maine were interred after the battleship exploded in Havana harbor in 1898, triggering the Spanish-American War. Recent scholarship has ascertained that the explosion was likely caused by faulty boilers, rather than a Spanish "torpedo".

I also wandered by the "Southernmost Point", a concrete bouy-like monument that is supposed to mark the "Southernmost Point" in the U.S. at the corner of Whitehead and South Streets. A cursory examination of the island reveals, however, that the monument isn't even the southernmost point on Key West. But it remains a favorite with tourists. When I was there, two disparate Cuban families had differing emotional responses to being 90 miles (actually closer to 94 miles) from their native soil. The first family occupied the northern side of the monument. They appeared to be rather wealthy and apparently very happy to be in the good ol' USA. The other family, on the south side of the marker, were obviously of much more modest means. Their focus was towards the sea and beyond towards Cuba. They appeared much more wistful; the mother was visibly crying. These two families seemed to represent a dichotomy presented by different Cuban-American groups -- those better off and longer established in this country and those, more recent, less affluent arrivals, who long only for home.

Oh yeah, I nearly forgot. One of the oddist things about Key West (and the Keys in general) is an unusual affinity for chickens. It seems that several thousand chickens roam the island, mostly feral descendents of fighting cocks imported long ago, now protected by law. Many local residents consider the birds a nuisance, while others do whatever they can to protect them.

As I previously noted, I was originally only going to stay in Key West for two nights, then head back north towards Daytona, then across to Pensacola. But Tropical Storm Hanna was still dumping massive amounts of rain on the Florida mainland on the day I was scheduled to leave. So I stayed for two more days. I arrived in Key West on the 10th, rode out to Marathon and back on the 11th, then Hanna hit the mainland on the 12th. I stayed over in Key West until the morning of the 15th. I actually welcomed the delay. It gave me a bit more time to roam the island and to rest up for the trip home.

The time passed quickly. The ride back loomed. I packed up the gear and headed back up U.S. 1, back across those 42 bridges, back across the "18 Mile Stretch" to Homestead. Daytona was now off of the itinerary, but to avoid re-tracing my path back up U.S. 27, I headed for I-95 and the Florida Turnpike aka the Ronald Reagan Turnpike. Now I've got nothing against naming a highway or an airport after a popular two-term President, but there has always been something rather "Soviet" about the practice of doing so while he's still alive. A bit too much "Cult of Personality" for my tastes.

The only really outstanding feature of the aforementioned Presidential tollway is the numerous tollbooths. It seemed to me that I had to stop every 15-20 miles to dig out yet more change to ride on this monument to Lincoln's assertion that you can fool some of the people all of the time. (How else could Bonzo get re-elected?)

Anyway, I followed Reagan's road over the top of U.S. 27 and back to I-75, stopping for the night in Gainesville. The next morning, on my way out of town I made a beeline to the Gainesville Harley dealer just off of I-75 for a new front tire and an oil change. A cop had brought his duty bike into the shop for an estimate. He said that somebody hit-and-run his parked machine, but it seemed fairly obvious that he had just dropped the thing and was too embarrassed to own up to it.

I left Key West about 6:30 AM on Sunday. I stopped in Gainesville Sunday afternoon and got an oil change and a new front tire on Monday morning. I finally got back on the road around 11:15 AM. I got off I-10 just after passing through Tallahassee and rode down to the coast. The ride to the coast was fine, but trying to ride ALONG the coast was pretty slow going, especially trying to get through the abomination called Panama City!! The place is congested when there's no one around-- it must be a madhouse during Spring Break. I tried to skip the rest of Route 98 by heading back up to I-10, but while it was clear along the coast, 5 miles from shore was storming, so I had to double back and continue along 45-mph-hell all the way to Pensacola. I stayed in Pensacola for two nights. I had to go the Harley dealer to see why my bike had developed an oil leak. I was right in suspecting that the Gainesville people had f---ed up. The oil filter was loose. The thing that concerned me was that the same guy had replaced the front tire. Ouch.

She's as sweet as Tupelo Honey...
While in the Florida panhandle, I pulled into the tiny burg of Wewahitchka. I asked folks where the Lanier's who sold honey lived. I was told where to find them and that if they weren't home, that "There'll be jars of honey sittin' on a table by the back door. The price'll be on the jars. Just put your money in the big jar on the table."!!!! When I got there, sure enough, there was a card table with jars of honey by the back screen door. The woman of the house came out to greet me. We chatted a bit. I bought some honey and rode away. Renewed.

I then headed south for the Florida coast at Port St. Joe. I continued along the coast, past Tyndall A.F.B., where I saw an as yet non-operational F-22 Raptor on final approach; through Panama City, where the residents were still sweeping sand from Tropical Storm Hanna that had dropped nine inches of rain; up through Fort Walton Beach and Gulf Breeze, heading for Pensacola.

I had planned all along to visit the Naval Aviation Museum at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola. There were a variety of aircraft on display -- including a Curtiss P-40 Tomahawk, painted in a "Flying Tiger" paint scheme. I watched an impressive IMAX film about the Blue Angels precision flight team, who are stationed at the Air Station. I really enjoyed the museum. Even though I have never been overly fond of the military -- especially while I was part of it -- but I've always liked airplanes. It just so happens that the finest airplanes are developed for killing people.

While riding in Pensacola, I noticed "Appomattox Drive". It was a dead end.

Anyway, after leaving Pensacola on Wednesday morning, I rode over to the Alabama shoreline and after crossing Mobile Bay on the ferry, I headed back to I-10. (The crossing was pretty neat. In 2001, when I took the bike out to Colorado and Utah, I crossed Lake Powell on a ferry. I guess it's getting to be habitual.) I then zoomed over to New Orleans (via the 24-mile Lake Ponchartrain Causeway). I was there long enough to get lost -- twice; find the Harley store in the French Quarter and buy the requisite T-Shirt; have a cup of French roast coffee and a piece of chocolate-fudge cake at La Madeline on Jackson Square; get the eye from the only identifiable hooker around (no thanks); then get stuck in pre-rush-hour traffic heading out of town. Missing a turn allowed me to take the 38-mile stretch of elevated roadway on I-310 to I-10 to I-55 from Luling to Ponchatoula. I still made it to Jackson, MS in time for a good catfish dinner at a place called "Holy Mackerel". I told the waiter that if the catfish were any fresher, it'd still be swimmin'. I'm sorry, but that catfish was 10 times more enjoyable than the red snapper I had in Pensacola.

Homeward bound, I wish I was, homeward bound...
I have a terribly powerful homing instinct and, by Thursday morning it was raging. I got an early start and rode from Jackson, MS through Memphis and St.Louis, all the way to Kansas City, a distance of about 750 miles. In and of itself, that's not saying a great deal. After all, I have ridden as much as 1,080 miles in the same day, but the ride from Jackson to KC was "blessed" with more than 250 miles of wet and rainy weather, something I had up until then mostly avoided. I knew that a strong front was passing through Missouri, but I was hoping to make it out of St. Louis before it hit. I figured that the combination of the storm heading east and me heading west would minimize my suffering a bit. But I got rained on as soon as I crossed from Arkansas into Missouri, and then got really dumped on as I left St. Louis. I stopped underneath an overpass and put on the rain gear near Wentzville. It rained hard enough that I considered pulling off the road due to poor visibility and wet roads. The downpour persisted for nearly thirty miles before any let up. Then, it just rained for the next 60 miles or so. Once I got to Columbia, in the center of the state and a mere 120 miles from home, the sky was clearing. I thought I had it made. Wrong. Only twenty miles down the road at Boonville, a very black, ugly cloud formation seemed to threaten an imminent tornado. Even though the road was pretty wet, and the semi-trucks roared menacingly as never before, I cranked the throttle to above 80 mph to outrun the potential twister and those damn trucks. The rain was relatively light from then on, but the temperature dropped into the mid to low 60's -- over a 30 degree drop since New Orleans. By the time I got home, I was wet, cold and my arms so sore that I could barely pull the clutch lever halfway when shifting gears. I guess I could have stayed in St. Louis and ridden home the next day in nearly perfect weather... but then there's that damn homing instinct.....