Key West Harbor Walk

Well the weather today is perfect, 65 degrees, sunny with no real humidity. We headed down to the harbor walk in a continuation of documentation of every inch of the island. The harbor walk would essentially be a path through the harbor and marinas at the northwest tip of the island.  It starts at the ferry terminals and at Dante’s. Dante’s is a pretty cool spot right on the water with a pool, if you buy food or drink you are welcome to use the pool. Apparently they allow women to sun bathe topless there, not sure if that is policy or if some ladies were just skirting the rules.

The harbor

Along the harbor is full of boats offering a variety of marine experiences. There are fishing boats ranging from small to huge, there are small private snorkel boats, large water sports boats, parasail boats, scuba diving boats and a bunch of private yachts. Some of the yachts are off the chart in terms of buying price. A small yacht or sport fisher can cost often a million plus brand new, but there are boats common in the harbor which would cost 50 to 100 million to buy. The amount of gas it takes to move some of those boats is pretty incredible as well.

Conch Republic Seafood Company

Anyways, fishing, diving, snorkeling, dolphin tours, bird watching you name it you can get a boat to take you from the harbor. In addition to the boats along the harbor there are a number of kinds of iconic places to eat. There is the Half Shell Raw Bar which is known for their deals on oysters during happy hour. Oysters aren’t really native to the Keys, so these are shipped in from the gulf fresh and they are delicious. Turtle Kralls is another water front restaurant, they have a pretty cool area to sit on the roof where you can look out over the harbor. Then there is the Conch Republic Seafood Company, and A & B Lobster house. All are known as good restaurants.

wack graffiti

There is also Schooner Wharf bar which is a popular drinking establishment. Behind Schooner Wharf there is a little lane called Lazy Way. It is home to a bunch of hole in the wall shops. More recently it became home to the failed harbor walk condo project. Some developers bought the land there and built one example town house and went tits up and bankrupt, leaving a huge empty lot right by the waterfront. The area is surrounded by a white fence and locals apparently have taken to covering the fence with graffiti . Not really much of a theme to the art though, I was kind of hoping it would be anti-development or something . I did read one spot that said “give pease a chance”, there were some kind crappily drawn peace signs and mushrooms, the graffiti looked like something maybe a 14 year old hippie girl would do on the back of her notebook in study hall. It was like family friendly graffiti and it almost looked like it was all painted by the same person.