Shoestrappers

Sometimes the best trips are the spontaneous ones. While we booked tickets many months in advance, this trip was a combination of having to use travel credit before a certain date and knowing that a trip to see Christine and Hande is always a good time. SOoo.. Savitri and I spent a week in Florida visiting them, with a quick side quest to Key West. We did very little planning in advance, especially since I worked on and off and at weird hours along the way, but all-in-all we squeezed a lot of good times out of one week! Oh and.. Florida is geographically beautiful despite being a political cesspool. We were impressed by how many progressive people we met, there is hope!

It was a short flight, partly because we tend to fly farther, but also because we were able to fly from Worcester! Sometimes the prices are equivalent or better than Logan and Ashok & Leanna even dropped us off. With TSA PreCheck we skipped the five people in line and were ready to go in under 10 minutes. On the other end of the flight Estero is 20 minutes from the Fort Myers airport so Christine picked us up and the whole thing felt like a drive to VT. We left after lunch and were there for dinner. In fact…

We drove directly to a restaurant since it was Savitri’s birthday! Christine took us to one of their local favorites, Bicyclette Cookshop, and we quickly understood why. I guess you’d call it Fusion or maybe New American.. lots of different cuisines mixed in cool ways. I didn’t catch all the dishes but they were all seriously good and the team top-notch.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen somebody really get creative with onion rings. They come with different types of batter and in different sizes, but Iberico ham and shredded manchego?! Now anything less will feel soo pedestrian.

Simple things done right aren’t so simple.

As we considered dessert, they brought this ~bowl of ice cream out with a candle and Christine’s face lit up. Vanilla soft serve with fennel pollen, louie’s olive oil, and maldon salt. I mean it sounds good but can it really.. DAMN! This is probably the best ice cream I’ve ever had, and that is saying a LOT. The fennel and vanilla are subtle, but the olive oil (made on Louie’s farm in Italy) is just magical with the salt. We ordered a second one while we dug into the first one. Savitri kept this face going the whole time.. at least in my head, as I’m sure it mirrored mine.

Had it been any other dessert assortment this butter cake would have been a starter, but as delicious as it was it sat on the bench and applauded the ice cream.

Christine and Hande have a beautiful new home in Estero, between Fort Myers and Naples on the Gulf of Mexico coast. They live in a community that has a shopping center, a restaurant, and importantly, a big gym complex with pickleball courts!

The weather was unseasonably cool. In the 50s (Fahrenheit) several days and most evenings, 60s most days and touched the 70s once. We left a snowstorm behind us in Massachusetts though so.. mostly T-shirt weather.

The next day was Hande’s birthday! We went to Oak & Stone, a fun, casual brewery and eatery nearby. They have a unique serve yourself drink tap wall that tracks the quantities per person. Great food too!

We went to Buckingham Farms in the eastern part of Fort Myers. It’s a farm, a restaurant, an event place, a little of everything. We grabbed some seriously filling sandwiches & salad and sat out in the sun with Booger! Booger.. is a Spur-Thigh Tortoise that lives in a shallow outdoor enclosure next to the picnic tables.

We visited Manatee Park, an odd juxtaposition of dozens of manatees hanging out in the warm water run-off of a huge Florida Power & Light Plant. Not sure if it’s tragic or symbiotic but they seemed happy and it keeps them away from boat propellers. Reminds me of The Blue Lagoon in Iceland, know for being a magical opaque blue water spa with cleansing silt… all in the run-off from a huge geothermal plant.

Six Mile Cypress Slough Preserve is a relaxed boardwalk through the woods. Lots of birds, turtles, and humans. It’s surrounded by road sounds but also very peaceful and filled with wild creatures.

Feeling too relaxed and coddled, we decided to drive five hours to Key West. The first half is driving east through the Everglades to Miami, the second half is driving along the keys. We’ve both always wanted to do it and Christine was nice enough to let us take her car so we went for it!

We had bought a key lime pie at Buckingham Farms which we all made short work of. I think that prompted us to transition into “who makes the best key lime pie?” mode. When in Rome..

First stop, Blonde Giraffe Key Lime Pie Factory in Tavernier, on Key Largo. Homemade whipped cream on top. In a plastic clamshell because we took it to go and ate at a picnic table out back. It was.. damned good. The whipped cream was real but didn’t contribute. The custard was on the lighter side, very smooth, medium crumble crust and moderately tart.. or as we say “puckery”. The pucker factor is subjective of course, both how puckery something is and how desirable that is. Savitri and I are both pro-pucker (easy now..) and her key lime pie is way more puckery than anything we tried on this trip.

For the sake of completeness (of our totally selective and unscientific two-day evaluation), we felt that the Buckingham Farms key lime pie was medium density, smooth, light crust and a little tart. Strong showing, especially considering convenience, which the Keys do not share!

Most of the Keys are right at water level; it felt like a big wave could crash over the road at any time. Fortunately most of the way the water was calm and there are lots of little islands and sandbars slowing down the waves.

We stayed at Andrew’s Inn just off of Duval St, the main drag in Key West. It was expensive, but consistent with the area. Considering the vibe, the great team there, the included breakfast (simple but did the trick), and the great location we’d stay there again.

We had lunch at El Siboney, a popular Cuban spot known for simple authenticity. It was filled with <us> tourists and even some guided groups but it sort of reminded us of some places in Puerto Rico and was quite enjoyable. We had a varied assortment of rice & beans, shrimp (big & tender in little mofongo-like shells of plaintain!), and roast pork. They are known for the roast pork and it did not disappoint, juicy and flavorful!

Apparently Ironbeer is the Cuban soft drink of choice and the hot thing around here. Described as a fruity Dr Pepper and as an herbal or root-beer like soda I was all in. I was.. not thrilled. Sure it has some fruity, herbal notes, but it’s super sweet and tastes like cheap bubblegum. Ironicbeer maybe? I left half a can and had water.

Roosters rule Key West. Not one attacked us and several posed so I’m a fan. Love those colors.. sort of a progressive pride flag with dinosaur legs.

Some random snazzy ~mint celeste Vespas for all you Vespa-heads.

The official southernmost point in the continental United States buoy… and a shot taken from a pier about a hundred feet south of it. Yes I know and I still find it funny. Also the real southernmost point of solid land in the continental US is about half a mile west-southwest of here on a military base. The whole idea is concocted since the Keys themselves are islands that humans connected with bridges and there are other Florida islands just south of them.

Less arbitrary is the nearby start/end of US Highway 1.

For a little change up we went to Kermit’s Key Lime and got their “famous” <Frozen> Chocolate-dipped Key Lime Bar. Totally unfair to compare frozen with unfrozen, it’s really a whole different food group. The texture is all different, the cold changes your sense of flavor.. we need to go back and have a fresh piece too. That said it was very tasty, slightly tangy, and had a dense cookie crust (although density is also affected of course). Savitri is clearly a better eater-modeler than I am, but I do catch the chocolate shell pieces as they fall off!

Now that we’d taken a healthy break, we walked to Pepe’s Cafe.. known for their key lime pie. We excitedly brought it back to our room and.. stowed it in the fridge.

We went to dinner at Little Pearl as a sort of birthday part two for Savitri. They are a small restaurant in a less active area. They are upscale-but-chill.. with a tasting menu of creative dishes. The food was tasty and I left full despite the plates all feeling small. Maybe that means they’re just right?

We had breakfast at Andrew’s Inn, pretty standard “continental fare. Of course it was just preparation to finally eat our Pepe’s key lime pie! In fairness it had been sitting in the fridge now for 12 hours, but that didn’t seem to affect our measures. It had a medium density, smooth body, and a nice dark crumble. No pucker though! Not “bad” by any means, but not the winner.

We did the obligatory tour of Ernest Hemingway’s The Hemingway Home and Museum. Everybody does it and everybody says it’s super popular and everybody says it’s still worth it. Well I’m here to tell you.. it’s true. It can be WAY overcrowded, as it was when we were there, but it was still well presented and very interesting. Listen to the guides, they are well-trained and put a lot of energy into telling the stories.

Somehow having his ~60 cat family there established a sense of continuity with his life. All of the cats on the premises, and allegedly all cats in Key West that haven’t been brought in recently, are related to Hemingway’s cats. They share a polydactyl gene that means about half of them have six toes. That’s cool and very visible, but I think the idea that they are given free range throughout the estate is even more cool. They have a large cat house but also hang out on the beds, chairs, couches, etc that would normally be considered untouchable exhibits elsewhere (humans are prohibited from following their examples). They are also super friendly and approach the thousands of visitors to get petted. What a life!

Hemingway’s face and literary legacy are strong in America, but I had forgotten (never realized?) his ties to so many famous people and events. Walking through his house felt much more like just that than touring a museum.

Across the street from Hemingway’s House is the Key West Lighthouse and Keeper’s Quarters. Admittedly I was most interested in the view from the top, but became far more intrigued by the lenses and the amazing line of women who kept the light going for so many years!

We had lunch at Moondog Cafe & Bakery. This was definitely a highlight of Key West and highly recommended. Once again it has a big tourist appeal and long lines, but they really deliver.

We sat at the bar, which pro-tip is almost always the best place to sit if you can be comfortable in a stool. You often establish a relationship with the bartenders and/or cooks (depending on the place) and get a real inside view into how they work. In this case we just chatted a lot with our server, but he was super attentive, friendly, and energetic and we appreciated it. We also had a great view of the baking section where we watched a wide array of unbelievable treats be produced by a couple ladies in a tiny space.

There are distinct families of key lime pies, and Moondog is known for meringue on top instead of whipped cream. After trying theirs I am firmly in the meringue camp! At the same time their key lime custard is a lighter, less smooth variety and I think I prefer it smooth. It was nice and tart however, and combined with the meringue was outstanding. We cleaned the plate on an atomic level.

So.. on this trip we had five different key lime pie variations in a completely silly, biased, invalid comparison from which we will pick a winner. 2026 logic baby! We wish we had tried the meringue-topped pie at Blond Giraffe. We wish we had tried the fresh pie at Kermit’s. We wish we had found the time and stomach depth to go to Blue Heaven, another highly-rated option known for their mile-high meringue.. but we didn’t. Next time. For now.. the best key lime pie we had was Blond Giraffe, and we think the meringue topping option would make it even better. In Key West Moondog is the clear winner, but Blue Heaven is a promising unknown.

As an aside.. a gentleman had some sort of episode and fell on the floor behind us at the bar at Moondog. The staff was blazingly fast to seat and stabilize him and the EMTs were on the scene promptly. After lots of debate about past falls and issues he let them haul him out on a stretcher. We were impressed with how it was all handled and hope he is well.

Long drive back to Estero, with a bonus sunset at a faux rest area.

We visited Wonder Gardens in Bonita Springs. They house, care for, and display rehabilitated animals. It’s sort of a small zoo, with generally very accessible enclosures. The first area is birds and I was emotionally struck by the Yellow-headed Amazon parrot that looked so much like our dear old Gabriel. I’m glad he didn’t talk the talk, it would have been too much.

This cute little bugger wasn’t in an enclosure, and turns out to be a Peter’s Rock Agama, an invasive species spreading across the region due to lost pets.

The left bird is not amused by the right birds canoodling..

These are some big birds up close!

Lovely orchids..

Golden Pheasant indeed!

Stunning reptiles..

Stunning Plumage!

All I’ll say is that this was the only family-appropriate version of this photo. Girls are silly.

While we were in Bonita Springs, we walked down the main street and checked out all the art tents and little cabins. We visited a cool little coffee shop then visited.. the Bonita Banyan! Oh soo climbable!

We went to the famous Turco Tacos in Naples. It’s a fast food taco shop but really high quality and tasty. I can see why Christine and Hande love them! In classic form I managed to take a picture of the sauces and not the tacos themselves, which we dove into aggressively. Maybe the best reviews don’t have pictures for that reason..

We drove down a nearby cul-de-sac in a fan-cy part of town and watched the sunset. It was really cold and windy out but.. damn.

Surprising nobody, we went to Gelato & Co on Fifth Ave and had some premo gelato. I had one of my all-time favorite pairings, dark chocolate with mango sorbet!

We packed a lot into this little trip and really enjoyed it. Huge thanks to Christine & Hande for making it easy and fun! We’ll be back!