The One With All The Birthdays - Day 1, the road to Key West

[RobynPrincess]

I slept like a total log and woke up at 6am feeling refreshed, Sy wasn't awake quite yet so I chilled out and surfed the internet for a little bit until he woke up. I then imessage'd Anne to see if they were awake at about 6:45am, they were up so I called my mum who I knew would be up as she's a super early riser and we made plans to go down for breakfast at 7:45. I wanted to eat sooner cause I wanted to wash my hair after breakfast (cause it takes an age!) but my mum said they wouldn't be ready so we settled on 7:45. 7:15 came and my mum called us to say they were ready and heading down early! Grrrr. I had only just got out of the shower by this point so had to fiddle with my hair a bit first and get dressed before we could head down. We were down there for 7:40ish, Anne and Cliff came down later.

I grabbed some first morning pics of us all looking excited.









Not really sure what Cliff was doing here, but I love this pic... hehe



Breakfast was really quite good. It wasn't too busy and there was plenty of choice. I loved the make-your-own waffle station of course



Breakfast finished we arranged to meet down by the car at 9am ready to hit the road. We headed back up to the room to pack up the few bits we unpacked the night before and hung around in the room for a bit. Our room overlooked the pool, it looked soooo inviting but we had places to go so no time for a dip sadly!



9am came so we left the room and went to knock for Anne and Cliff on the way down to make sure they were ready. Their room looked like a bomb had gone off lol they were still packing etc. I went back to our room as we were just stood in the doorway, Sy stayed and tried to hurry them along. As time went on waiting my patience wore thin so I left our room again and stopped in to get the keys from Sy so I could at least start loading the car, he refused to give them to me as he said they wanted to move the seats around in the back. I went on ahead anyway as by now it was 9:15 and I knew my parents would be down there wondering what was going on. I found them stood at the car where they had been since 9am. Not really ideal for either of them with their various health problems, I asked why they didn't go back into reception where there were seats but they said they kept expecting us to arrive so thought it would be better just to wait. I brought mum back in to reception to sit down and left dad with all the cases while I went to go find Sy to tell him to get a move on. Sy and his parents came down in one lift while I was going up in the other, it was 9:30 by now. We headed out to the car and packed the bags into the back, no seats were rearranged beforehand. So much for not letting me have the keys as they needed to be moved around...

Stress and drama over with, we were on the road and ready to start our roadtrip! Well I say on the road, we left the hotel car park and crossed the road to the Publix where we grabbed some drinks and food so we could stop for lunch along the beach. LOL

Back in the car after Publix and we really were on our way! Woohoo! Sy got into the driving seat again and I sat in the middle seats with Cliff, with mums in the row behind. My dad sat with Sy in the front as his knees were hurting - a combination of the plane yesterday and being stood still for so long outside the hotel. The drive to Key West isn't bad as far as drives go, there were plenty of things to look at. I had made a list of places of interest we could stop at if we needed to stretch our legs, first stop was Robbie's of Islamorada. This was a weird sort of place, really tacky but in a kinda good way. I'm really pleased we stopped there and I would definitely stop there again, the only downside was the toilets left a little to be desired... and there was only 1 of them.

 

[RobynPrincess]

We looked round the tacky little stalls and took loads of pictures before heading over to the bar to grab a drink. The bar/restaurant was really busy even though it was still before lunchtime. We ordered drinks at the bar and managed to find a seat right by the water's edge. The table and benches were really pretty made from mosaics.





The real reason I wanted to stop here though was for the tarpon feeding. So Sy, Anne and I went off to feed them while the others took pics from the side and sipped their drinks. We got 1 bucket of fish between the 3 of us and it was more than enough fish, think it cost about $6 for us all to do the feeding inc the fish. Not bad if you ask me!



I filmed Sy feeding them but then when it was my turn he was covered in fish so he didn't want to touch the camera, so I left it to my dad to take a few pictures... I really should know better! Haha. So I can only apologise for the next pictures... blame dad

Ooh that's a good one dad, cut my head off....



And this one I'm not even feeding them! I'm just sat by the water...



He got the right hump when I laughed at the pics! He said he thought he was meant to be getting the fish, not me as well.

Once we were done we headed back over to the others, washing the fishy smell off our hands on the way. Back at the table round 2 of drinks were getting ordered. I didn't want another as I still had a fair bit of mine from before. Anne got a Bloody Mary the first time however this time Cliff ordered her a 'Trailer Trash'. You've never seen anything like that cocktail! I'm not even gonna explain it to you, I'll just show you...







How rank is that?! HAHA The pepperami had a hole through the middle for it to be used as a straw! It make us all giggle. It also was VERY strong so all the men helped Anne drink it (baring in mind her first drink was very strong too and it was still before lunch).

Thought this sign was quite apt.



After everyone had finished their second round of drinks we headed back to the car, mum stopped at the restroom on the way - I wasn't quite brave enough and luckily I didn't need to be Still, at least they were colourful...



I took a pic of the sky while I waited, it was just so pretty



We set off again for another hour or so before we hit Anne's beach (this was the name of the beach, not that Anne had been there before and laid claim or anything lol). We parked the beast in the very tiny car park and headed down the Boardwalk to find somewhere to sit and eat our lunch. It was baking hot sunshine by now so I went to the bathrooms to spray on some suncream, not realising that the tables were all under shade, oh well! I also used the bathroom here and it was much nicer than at Robbie's. We found a table really easily and proceeded to munch through our lunch. It was a rather weird lunch, Sy and Cliff had bought sandwiches from Publix while the rest of us had cheese, crackers, fruit, crisps (or chips depending on where you're from ), and some apple slices with toffee (I LOVE THESE!! Why don't they do this in the uk?!)









After lunch we went for a paddle. We were going to walk back to the car park via the water but it got too deep in between the boardwalk entrances so us girls (and Sy) turned back and left Cliff and Bill walking. Unfortunately though my dad was too busy trying to hold up his shorts he dragged the bags of food in the water! Hehehe oops. Luckily everything in that bag was still sealed

Back at the car park there was a shower and a little shower for your feet so I washed all of the sea off of my feet in the little shower. I moved round to get the underneath of my foot and mistook the wrong 'on' button. Of course I happened to be stood right under the main shower at that point... Yeah I showered myself fully clothed hahaha. Its okay though, no one saw I dusted myself off, pretended that I meant to do it, held my head high and walked back to the car... I totally thought I got away with it without a total ripping until the first thing my dad said was 'why are you wet?'. Doh! I had to fess up and everyone laughed, ah well! It was pretty funny lol at least with the heat down there I was dry in no time

Back in the car Cliff fell asleep almost right away and I joined him soon after. Annoyingly that meant I missed the best bit of the journey - the miles of road over the water! Nooooo! (I totally forced myself to stay awake on the way back though so it was okay ) I was really disappointed at the time though.

 

[RobynPrincess]

I slept for about an hour, half an hour after I woke up we arrived in Key West. We checked into our hotel Parrot Key, at 3:30pm. The girl checking us in was from Sheffield! Wasn't really expecting to meet many British people in the Keys though she said there were a fair few of us staying there over the next week. It really is a small world She showed us on the map where our villa was and she said it was the best location in her opinion (and I totally agreed). Our villa was beautiful! Oceanfront and right by sunset pier. The living space was on the middle floor so we agreed my parents would have the bedroom on that floor so they wouldn't need to keep going up and down the stairs. We took the bottom floor which had a door straight out to the oceanside. Anne and Cliff had the top floor. All the rooms was so beautifully decorated Not to blow my own trumpet too much, but I did well when finding this hotel. It was in the 'new' part of Key West so it wasn't walking distance to Duval (well it might have been for some but not for me!) but that didn't matter as we had the beast to get around in. We had cleverly packed so that all the stuff we would need over the next few nights was all in one case so we unpacked that case and put the other to one side. We then went for a swim in 1 of the many pools. Everyone but Anne came as she wasn't feeling well. The pools were salt water which was a bit of a surprise, but they weren't sticky like the sea so it was all good with me

Some pics from the pool.















When we came back we realised we had no fridge, there was a space for one so I gave front desk a call to find out that there was a fault with them causing fires so they to remove them from all of the rooms (I wonder if this was the same fridge as Disney last year?). It wasn't the ideal situation but it wasn't the end of the world, we managed to survive with the cool box and bags of ice from the ice machine.

I was feeling a little dodgy after the swim so had a lay down for a bit, I usually get a bit ill the day or so after the flight so it was to be expected. I felt better a short while later and so we all got dressed and headed out for some food.



I had a huge list of places to go eat, unfortunately it was a bit late for Duval now and it was SO busy and it really put me off when I was already feeling a bit dodgy, it was full of fairly drunk people and it would have meant parking a long way away and walking which I wasn't up for.

Duval was full of interesting characters, we saw this guy cycling up the road with blaring speakers playing music - btw he wasn't selling those light up things, he was just cycling up and down waving at people!



We drove round and round and ended up right back over where our hotel was at the Outback across the road! It wasn't a bad choice though as everyone enjoyed their meal. I started with my favourite cocktail in the whole world, Wallerby Darned.







I had chicken tenders, Sy had steak and shrimp, I don't remember what everyone else had other than my dad who had telapia which he LOVED, my mum also loved it and ate half of his





My main meal was cold the first time they brought it out and we then couldn't find our server :-/ eventually we asked a different server and she took it away and said they were going to cook me a whole fresh order (I had eaten the baked potato already while waiting as I was starving). In the mean time everyone else finished their meals so I asked if they could box mine up to take away, I thought maybe Anne would have a bit as she hadn't come out with us (too ill). Our server was really apologetic but it didn't really matter, I didn't mind taking it away. We paid the bill and left him a nice tip before heading back to the hotel. Anne was asleep on the sofa when we got back as she didn't want to go up to bed while no one was in. She didn't want any of my food so I ate what I could of it and Sy and his dad finished the rest off

We were all flagging now so we made our way to bed after a pretty great first day!

 

[dixonsontour]

Good trip down

 

[Disneymadhouse]

Lovely first day

Claire

 

[RobynPrincess]

Good trip down

It was, I'm not the best car passenger as I get bored but there's so much to look and see, I'd do it again in a heartbeat

Lovely first day

Claire

Thanks for reading!