Cruise! Key West (via Carnival Fascination sailing January 16th 2012)

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This blog entry is specific to Key West. My ship entry is here: http://www.travelblog.org/Oceans-and-Seas/Atlantic/blog-681988.htmland Nassau is here: http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Bahamas/Nassau/blog-681996.html.

Wednesday we were up bright and early - we had arrived to key West!

We got off the boat to explore for a little bit before our 9:30AM hop excursion meetup time. ( Early, I know, but we had to be back on the boat by 2:30PM for departure.) We wandered around to Mallory square and took pictures of the ship. We saw how everything centers around Duval Street and also marvelled at the chickens and roosters that were everywhere.

By 10AM we were on our way to our first stop on the bar hop, with stickers identifying us at the group prominently displayed. (We were informed local law enforcement recognized these stickers and would return us to the ship should anyone get carried away!) We went to 5 bars with a free drink at each. Not bad for $45! Our guide, Barnacle Beau, was alot of fun and what you would expect from the experience. Our bars included Lazy Gecko, Tree Bar, Flying Monkey, Schooners Wharf, And Rick's.

Lazy Gecko was what I consider a typical bar, but the Irish bartender was charming in his own ways which added to the appeal. Tree Bar was tucked in an alley way and right across the street. Flying Monkey had the walls of frozen drinks. I shied from the grain mixes and instead opted for a dirty monkey which was a mix with chocolate and banana ice cream with the alcohol. Talk about YUM! Schooner Wharf was a bar some friends had recommended. It's surrounded by beautiful boats and is by Jimmy Buffet's unmarked studio __?___ sound. It's open air. After the 4th stop, we had a conch blowing contest - and I made the finals! I'd never tried this before, but alas, I didn't win the coveted prize of the mardi gras beads. The last stop was Rick's which had a live acoustic guitar / vocalist at that point. We purchased out photos we'd taken earlier in the excursion and were feeling quite good at that point!

We had time to burn so we got the required slice of Key Lime pie and walked across the street to Scars and Tattoos which was a bad we'd seen earlier. We got a local Key West beer and enjoyed it with our pie.

We met two Italian brothers at one of the stores we popped into. They were hilarious! I've got a picture of them posing for us before we grabbed an oversized cookie at the shop next door to them.

Key West as a city is a nice beach town. I feel like its hard to know it for more than the bars in my short time there. The people I met were all friendly!

By the time me and Heather got back on the boat at 2:30, we were feeling very good. We made our way to the pool and napped in the sunlight. After an hour we woke back up and returned to the room where sleep continued. That was pretty much the extent of Wednesday. It'd safe to say, Key West conquered me!

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