Tragedy in Key West

 

Cudjoe Key, Florida (high 82, low 72)

 

We always have fun in Key West and since we moved to Venture Out, we’re pretty close and go down often. 

It’s was always a fun place to be, until last night.

We got there about 7pm, parked by Mallory Square and walked over to where the Catman performs with his trained cats.

I’ve resisted his shows because I worry about the cats jumping through fire hoops.  I’ve also seen him carrying the cats in cages on the back of a scooter or bicycle and I didn’t like that. 

Anyway, our friend Heidi who is also an animal lover said his show was great, he obviously loved his cats and they were well treated.  We decided to give him a chance.

We watched him set up, then go get his cats.  Maybe it’s just us, but we thought it was a tad boring.  The rest of the crowd appeared to love the show.  He had some sort of thick foreign accent and we had a hard time understanding him.

We didn’t wait for the fire rings because we were getting bored.

Maybe when you have cats that make you do tricks, you don’t need to see more.

Oh wait, his CATS DID THE TRICKS?   Ours just make us do their bidding.  :)

We left before the fire ring started.

 

Everyone was on the pier enjoying the beautiful cool evening and waiting for the sunset, which turned out to be a bit of a bust.

 

The usual boats are parading back and forth in front of the sun.

 

 

The street performers are drawing crowds.

This guy was on a tall unicycle while juggling fire.

 

 

At the time I took these pictures, little did we know that there was a horrible scene taking place right behind him.

Mallory Square is where the cruise ships dock when they are in port.   It’s at least 6-10 feet down to the water depending on the tide.

As we walked along, we heart some commotion and when we looked over the edge, we noticed a woman in the water, fully dressed.

The current was ripping due to the full moon.  I quickly looked around for a throw rescue ring.  There were none that I could see.  She was hanging onto a ladder, but I was concerned she would tire and get swept away. She yelled that she could not swim in the strong current. By the time I glanced down again, she was holding onto someone who was trying to pull her up.  No one had jumped in to help her.

I remember thinking, he was kind of scrawny and no way would he pull her up.

Fortunately, he did.  It turned out the guy was her boyfriend.  She told me he looked her in the eye and told her to hang on.  He then proceeded to pull her right up to safety.  Thank goodness.  At this point, we thought she must have just fallen in. She had on a skirt, not really the type of attire you would choose for an evening swim.

We found out later that she had jumped into the swift moving current to try to rescue another man.

A few minutes later she was wandering around by herself  in a daze and on the verge of tears. I went over to try to comfort her.  By this time, we knew the she had gone in to save someone else and he had likely died.   She kept saying, “no one would help him.”   Bless her.  She risked her life to try to save someone else.  She told me she saw him have a heart attack.  I don’t know if that was what happened for sure, but I imagine it’s possible because he was a heavy set man and probably over exerted trying to swim or get up the ladder.

We just happened to be near several people who witnessed the accident.  We were told two men decided to take a swim.  Al saw the bearded guy swimming in the water.  His friend was very heavy set and he is the one that needed to be rescued.  We don’t think he survived, but we don’t know for sure.

Somehow, someone got him out of the water and they performed CPR on him until the paramedics arrived and they took over CPR.

We witnessed a little of the frantic and rough CPR, all the while hearing his wife screaming and crying.  It was a sad situation and many of us were in tears.  My nurse friend has told me how bad CPR is and that it’s not something you want to have done.  We discussed this in regard to our elderly parents.

We saw the ambulance rush away, but we have little hope that he survived.

Hopefully, since CPR started right away he can be revived, but we wondered how long it took to get him out of the water.

We imagine alcohol was involved and some  macho male behavior.

This sign is painted all along the waterfront.

 

 

Many people were walking around unaware of what happened.  The party continued, but it was over for us. 

Conch Republic Independence Celebration – “A Farce to be Reckoned With”

 

Cudjoe Key, Florida  (high 85, low 72)

 

A big weather front moved through the Florida Keys a few days ago, bringing 5 inches of rain to Key West. We didn’t get that much rain but the front took the entire day to get past us.    Our site was pretty much high and dry but some of the streets in the park were pretty flooded.  the water was gone shortly though.

 

 

Last week was the annual Conch Celebration days and there were activities in Key West all week long.  If you missed the post about how Key West seceded from the Union, you can read about it HERE.   The night after the parade was the sea battle, which turned out to be a lot of fun, despite the crowd.

We got into town in time to find a parking space and get a bite to eat.  We discovered a place called  Paradise Pizza where we could get pizza by the slice.  It was good pizza, inexpensive and we didn’t overeat like we did the night before.  By the time you pay $2.50 an hour to park, it helps to have an inexpensive dinner.

The guy at the pizza place suggested we watch the parade at the Galleon Hotel.  It turned out to have a nice dockside bar with comfortable lounge chairs with a wonderful view.

The Galleon was on the waterfront but a good distance from Mallory Square where the nightly sunset celebration is held.

We wondered if we would miss most of the action if we stayed at the Galleon and debated if we should head down to Mallory Square. We had such a comfortable  place to sit with wonderful ocean breezes.

Al’s vote was to stay.  :)

The boats starting passing by right in front of us.  No crowds blocking our view.

Any type of boat or watercraft could join in the battle, if you were brave enough.

I was worried we wouldn’t see the main “battle” unless we went down to Mallory Square.  Al  was pretty happy at the Galleon, but he finally agreed to head down to Mallory Square. 

As we walked down towards Mallory, an Italian couple came up to us, and in very broken English  asked for directions to Mallory Square.  We told them to follow us and off we went.  There are so many foreign visitors in Key West. You hear Russian, Chinese, French, Italian and everything else you can think of.  Key West is getting way too popular.

Once we got to Mallory, we wondered if we had made a mistake because I don’t remember it ever being that crowded.

You could NOT see the water for the people.  Uh-oh, it looks like I messed up.  Our nice sea breeze was gone, it was HOT and crowded.

We finally found an area where we had a view of the waterfront.  One of the advantages of knowing the area.

This lady was sitting on the dock in front of us with her back to the action.  She had this bored look on her face and was messing on her phone the entire time. I don’ think she ever looked towards the setting sun or the “battle.”

Once the sun set and the battles were over, I couldn’t resist asking her why she didn’t enjoy the celebration.  She said that she had seen if so many times.  I wondered why she came, if all she was doing was taking up space.  I don’t care how many times you watch the sun set on Mallory Square, it’s spectacular and unique each time.  She missed a great show.

Here is what we saw. Do you think she missed anything?

 

You can see the water canons in the picture below.

 

The boats were passing back and forth along the waterfront.  Most had water canons, and a few had some sort of loud canons and smoke.

It looked like the Coast Guard cutter was on fire.

The Coast Guard had the definite advantage with the biggest water canons, but they were the “enemy,” so everyone was trying to get them.

There was a pretty good battle going on between the Coast Guard and the black sailboat, when this smaller yellow sailboat decided to join in. 

Next year maybe Paul and Marti can be here and get us a ride on the CG cutter?

We worried the yellow sailboat was going to get crushed. The crew got drenched for sure.

 

The sky started to come alive with planes and helicopters, dropping “bombs.”   (more commonly known as marine grade toilet paper)

Can you see the toilet paper in the picture below?

The squiggly things were rolls of TP.

As the sun started to set, I concentrated more on that than I did the battle.

 

A few lucky people snagged the best seat in the house, on top of the crows nest on this sailboat.

 

It was a fun night with a beautiful sunset.  This time of year, the sun sets behind the island.  Later on, it goes down right over the water, which is my favorite place.

 

The street performers were there, as always.

Playing with fire.

The coconut man

the coconut man’s supply truck

After sunset, we called it a night, but not before walking down Duval Street.

This is the Wyland gallery.  He is the artist that painted that beautiful mural I showed in a previous post.  He also painted the mural at the K-Mart in Marathon.  If you’re in Key West, be sure to go to his gallery.

 

 

and last but not least.   Someone just had to walk around with toilet paper stuck to her shoe, didn’t they?