Key West recap
So I have been slacking on my blog and not keeping up with
it. No real excuses, just having too much fun.
Last I wrote I was living in Key West in floating
accommodations working hard during the week and enjoying playing tourist on the
weekends. Jon and I took advantage of being “locals” and getting discounted or
free entry to the attractions in town. I think our favorite was Truman’s Little
White House, for me the Florida Keys Discovery Center was a close second.
I worked as a painter. This isn’t as simple as it may sound.
The marina where we worked is a floating dock system, so to accommodate the
tides there are metal pilings that are strategically placed to hold the dock
attached to shore and not drift off. These pilings see a bit of wear and tear
from boats coming and going as well as their lines to tie up with. So before I
could paint I had to remove the rust and corrosion from the metal, then use a
special primer and then 4 coats of paint later voila! To remove the rust is a
dirty process. I was usually a sight to behold at the end of the day! I used a
device called a needle scaler, which has little metal rods that act like little
jackhammers so this created flakes of paint and rust and a hefty amount of rust
dust, which usually coated me from head to toe. My job also included a bit of
strategic planning so as to not get said dust and flakes on fancy expensive
yachts.
Our floating accommodations came via a Sea Base friend.
Bruce owns three sailboats and he had one that was not the right set up or size
for the scout program so it was sitting in a marina in Islamorada unused. Part
of the deal working at this marina in Key West is that dockage is free except
for two weeks when big events were happening in town, so Bruce got free dockage
for his boat and we got a free place to live, win-win! As a thank you to Bruce
we cleaned the interior, exterior and scraped the bottom of the boat, replaced
a missing custom cushion with the creative hands of Capt. Holley, replaced the
refrigerator thermostat with the skilled hands of Capt. Denny, as well as
replaced the marine head(toilet) to repair a crack and leak. During the two
weeks of the events in town we tied the boat up at the Conch Pearl mooring and
went back and forth via dinghy. Luckily for us both weeks had poor weather so
not all the boats showed up that had reservations so we were able to bring the
boat back in earlier than we anticipated. This was a special treat when my
parents were visiting so they could see the boat and Jon and I didn’t have to
transit back and forth in the dinghy.
Jon and I participated in the locals parade for Fantasy Fest
with several friends which was a lot of fun. We also took a few days to camp
out at the Dry Tortugas/ Fort Jefferson. The weather wasn’t great so we didn’t
get to do much snorkeling but we explored every inch of the fort and took all
the tours offered. We even saw one of the float planes that operates in
Southeast Alaska in the summer and the Florida Keys in the winter time! Jon was
of course wearing a SE Alaska Forest Service t-shirt for a photo op with the
plane! My parents flew down for a few days to visit and took the ferry out to
the fort. This was Jon’s first face to face introduction to my parents and we
were also out of cell phone range so we requested that my parents bring the
newspaper because the presidential election was going on and Jon was eager to
find out the results.
Holidays
With Christmas on the horizon Jon and I packed up our things
and headed north. We made a stop in Tampa to visit some of Jon’s family, then
flew to his mom’s in the DC area. We spent about 3 weeks relaxing and touring
around DC. Christmas was celebrated with Jon’s family, and New Years was a low
key night out to the movies.
We then took the train to Burlington and spent several weeks
painting my parent’s condo. We painted the entire first floor, ceiling, walls,
doors, trim, baseboards, even radiator covers. We even installed a few new
light fixtures. We then took the train back to DC so we could take advantage of
a great flight deal to Istanbul, Turkey. We spent about a week in Turkey,
mostly Istanbul seeing the sights and walking the city.
After Turkey I flew back to Vermont, and then resumed
painting. I finished up a few things at my parents, then moved on to my brother
and sister in law’s condo and painted their place as well. I was also
researching jobs in Southeast Alaska so that Jon and I could be together for
the summer as well as applying to jobs to hopefully return to Antarctica.
I interviewed for and accepted one position to work for a
tour company in SE Alaska and then got a phone call while I was out running
errands from another company that Jon thought I’d be happier with and quickly
accepted the offer and booked my flights to head to the 49th state!
