Key West Seafood Festival 2009

The annual Key West Seafood Festival took place again at Bayview Park. The best part was the touch tank, where you can see sea stars (aka starfish), sea urchins, conchs and the biggest lobster we've ever seen!

Key West Super Boat Races

This week the Key West Super Boat races are on, and we went out Wednesday afternoon on the boat to watch preliminaries, I guess that's what they were. The harbor is closed off from around in front of the Hyatt, on out to offshore, where the course extends. We watched for about an hour and a half then felt the urge to get some lobster.

To get across the harbor, you have to wait until they're in between races, then radio for a Coast Guard escort. They will send the "Coast Guard Auxiliary", which curiously has downriggers on it and some dirty fumes pouring out the back! It's really an offshore fishing boat that's been deputized for the event.

The best thing about the Key West Power Boat Races are the sounds of the engines and the helicopters flying with the boats. The best way to watch the power boat races is from a boat anchored in front of Sunset Key. There are red bouys marking the race course so stay behind them. For pictures, it's a good spot but get closer to the red balls for better shots. Standing at Mallory Square is fun, but it's HOT and crowded. The boats come really close to the pier there so you can see close ups of the boats, but you lose perspective and only see each boat for a few seconds. Watching from in front of Sunset Key lets you see more of the boats' power and speed.

We didn't want to wait for an escort across the harbor in order to get out and do some lobstering, so we went around the back of Key West. Behind the Coast Guard pier, and took a look at the Drug Sub they have captured there, from off the coast of Ecuador. Then over near Sunset Marina on Stock Island, then through Cow Key Channel and around the bend to the south side of Key West. It took about 25 minutes.

Superboat races are super exciting for about an hour, then it's time to move on.

Key West Power Boat Races

Key West Power Boat Races just finished for the year. For a first-timer, it was thrilling to hear the jet engines on those big boats as they practiced their runs during the week. Starting on a Wednesday they were out there in front of Key West throughout the day, with their close-flying helicopters tailing them in amazing precision. At first I thought the helicopters were there to film the boats as they drove at full speed. But they were also there during the actual Key West power boat races so it must be something to do with navigation. Maybe the boats go so fast and the drivers are situated so low in the cockpit they really can't see much around them. It's crazy to think they're racing around to close to Key West and other dive and fishing boats, not really able to see much. What?

Races were on Friday and Sunday, with practice and preparation on Thursday and Saturday. The power boats gather and register at Truman Annex waterfront and race a loop course that begins in Key West harbor and goes south towards Sand Key Light. They used to race eastwards along the south face of Key West but no more. People tell me it was pretty exciting in those days to watch the power boats come around the corner of the island in front of Fort Zachary Taylor, taking a sharp right turn into Key West harbor. Depending on the weather and the roughness of the seas, boats would often flip doing this curve. Someone even told me that a driver had a bad flip one year and the accident decapitated him. I haven't been able to verify this yet.

IF you want to view the Key West power boat races from up close and you want to sit down, you will have to shell out $15 for entrance in the bleachers area near the entrance to Fort Zachary Taylor. To save money, veer left into the park instead of going straight through the gates, where you will have to pay, even if you arrive on foot or by bicycle. Either go into Fort Zachary and pay the usual daily fee, which is about $2 or $4 for a bicycler, or bike over towards Mallory Square and squeeze in for a position at the water's edge against the rail. Few people go to the area between Fort Zachary and Mallory Square, which is where the cruise ships usually board. That's also an option.

The race consists of power boats doing a loop with their helicopters, zooming into the Harbor in front of Mallory Square where viewers can take action shots with their cameras. The noise of the helicopters is the first to arrive and serves as cue to get your camera ready for a picture. That's kind of it in a nutshell. You can't really tell who's winning or how each boat is doing, or whether a boat is having technical or mechanical difficulties. And after a while the thrill of the loud engines kind of wears off, until it's just some noise. After the races end, the helicopters gather in a group just off Sunset Key, and they look like a swarm of hornets hovering over the ocean. Then the crowd dissipates and it's just Mallory Square again.

Some people think part of the fun of Key West power boat races is the scene on Duval Street each night. Drivers and their teams wear their team jerseys and hit the bars or stroll proudly down Duval Street. There's added energy to the Duval Street scene when the Key West Power Boat racers are in town. They love to wear their jerseys everywhere they go, even if they're just going out to eat for lunch. And that, from a newcomer's perspective, is what Key West Power Boat races are all about.

Key West Body Paint

Key West body paint might be the largest single phenomenon that makes Fantasy Fest one of the largest events of the year. Body paint is often the costume of choice for a lot of people attending Fantasy Fest. It's a great way to go naked without really exposing everything you have. Key West body paint is an art form, and indeed body paint artists come to town for this major event. Local tatoo artists get in on the body paint action as well, applying their craft to more than just one medium. The styles and skills range from pretty good to truly amazing. I saw some body paint costumes that I thought were actual cloth costumes at first glance.

If body painting is done by an expert artist, the paint will look like really tight clothing. Even denim. I saw a woman wearing a western theme body paint costume, with red tied shirt on top and cutoff denim shorts on the bottom. You could tell the shirt was paint but the shorts looked real. Lots of women chose to have lingerie painted on. How to get a perfect fit...use body paint!

Sometimes Key West body paint becomes a show when artists apply their craft in a storefront window. Some nights during Fantasty Fest, for example, you can stroll past Fast Buck Freddie's, a gift store famous for its large display windows and ever-changing displays created by local artists. It's kind of like the windows at Macy's in New York at Christmastime. Anyway, during Fantasy Fest, they get a Key West body paint artist to paint willing and daring customers right in the display window. It's a tight squeeze, but the customer sits on a stool with her back to the street and the body paint artist applies the "costume". It's a spectacle and of course there's always a small crowd watching.

Fantasy Fest 2007

Fantasy Fest 2007 was a blast. It was my first Key West Fantasy Fest, and what I can say is I'm already counting the days until Fantasy Fest 2008. I feel like a kid waiting for Christmas to roll around again. It's a week long series of opportunities to become somebody completely different, or at least dress up in a totally different style and become as freaky, sexy, or magical as you can. Only your imagination will limit you. If you've never been to Fantasy Fest, it's really kind of difficult to imagine what it's like, and even more difficult to picture yourself dressing up in costume. If Fantasy Fest 2007 was your first time, then you
most definitely saw some inspiring costumes and body paint. If you were like me, you felt the vibe and joined in the fun and dressed up yourself.

The theme of Fantasy Fest 2007 was something about the mad hatter and being late, kind of Alice and Wonderland I think. It was a tough theme to follow, but most people did their best with Queen of Hearts costumes. There were a bunch of women who chose this costume, but that kind of left most men without a theme costume idea, except if they wanted to be a mad hatter or a late rabbit. In any case, most of the costumes I saw during Fantasy Fest 2007 didn't follow the grand theme. People were more likely to go as their own
personal fantasy, or to dress according to which party they were attending that night.

Each night of Fantasy Fest there are several themed parties sponsored by local Key West bars. For example there's the Plaid Party at Captain Tony's Saloon. Then there's the Toga party at Sloppy Joe's on Duval Street.
There's also the Red Party at Fogarty's, and the PJ's and Lingerie Party at another local Key West bar on Duval Street. There were also some new parties for Fantasy Fest 2007, including the Green Party at a local Irish bar, off Duval Street. The Red Party seems to be one of the favorites, as is the PJs and Lingerie Party. You see lots of devils at the Red Party of course, and well lingerie and PJs is an easy costume.

The theme parties at the Duval Street bars usually spill out into the street. The Plaid party at Captain Tony's Saloon is on a side street just off Duval, and the Key West Police block off the street so there's lots of room for Plaid people. As the week wears on, and more people show up in Key West, Duval Street is blocked off for pedestrian use every single day and night. Vendors line the streets, along with artists hawking their items. The crowds build and build and the town's population swells to triple its normal size. Fantasy Fest 2007 was no exception, with 60,000 people in town. By Saturday night, the night of the big parade event, it was
hard to press on through the crowds. If you had a Fantasy Fest costume with wings, good luck. There simply wasn't room! Good advice for Fantasy Fest 2008: don't wear any costume that incorporate wings or anything else that sticks way out. It won't survive the night.

Fantasy Fest Plaid Party

Fantasy Fest in key West is probably the biggest event of the year. What started out as a way to drum up business in the off season of Key West has become a nationally known event that's famous for good times, outlandish behavior, and zany adult antics that feature body paint, elaborate costumes, and lots of nudity. What more could you ask for? Like Mardis Gras, Fantasy Fest has beads and topless women, but it's better. That's because Fantasy Fest is smaller and less famous, so it hasn't been overrun by problems such as crime waves and a disproportionate number of loutish drunken people who spoil the fun. Yes, Fantasy Fest is partly fueled by drugs and alchohol, but you can still feel safe at night, even the final Saturday night when the crowds swell and out of towners flood the city and things get raucous. It's still fun and safe and probably nobody will pick your pocket or mug you.

Fantasy Fest starts out on a Tuesday night, with the Plaid Party at Captain Tony's Saloon, just of Duval Street. Even if you don't plan on paying to get into Captain Tony's, and you just want to hang out in the street and enjoy the fun, my advice is to wear plaid. Once you get downtown and see the great sexy costumes people come up with, you'll want to get into the spirit of things. Even if it's just a plaid pair of shorts or a plain bikini. One of the most popular plaid outfits for girls was a micro mini skirt with pleats, as short as can be. One of the coolest outfits was a plaid corset, worn with a white mile-high Louis XIV wig. Awesome! Another good one was a woman body builder who wore just an itsy bitsy plaid bikini.

Around 9pm or so, the Key West Police block off the side street where Captain Tony's Saloon is located, off Duval Street, so the Plaid Party can spill out into the street area. People in plaid mill about, comment on each others' costumes, take pictures with each other, have some drinks or some vendor food, and it's a great atmosphere. You can't help but feel the energy. As the night wears on, more and more plaid people come out and the costumes get more daring.

Fantasy Fest

Fantasy Fest is one of the best things about Key West. The coral reef is the best thing, hands down, but
Fantasy Fest comes in at a strong second. No other place in the country do you get a week long festival that
inspires so much adult creativity, so much baudy good fun and such energized street life. The atmosphere is
contagious because everyone is in such a good mood so you just can't help getting into the spirit of things.
The energy is positive and fun, and even those not used to even wearing a bathing suit in public will feel less
inhibitions at Fantasy Fest. I'd say a third to half the people in the streets are either scantily clad or
topless altogether. It's like going to a topless beach. If everyone is doing it, it's no big deal and you can
just be one of the crowd. Unlike Mardis Gras, nobody will grab you. Almost all of the women going topless are
also body painted, so it's an art form for people to admire. And they do admire. Strangers approach topless
strangers and complement them. Sometimes they ask if they can take a picture. It't nothing invasive or rude,
and everyone that wears a costume or body paint is fine with having their picture taken. If you aren't cool
about photos, then you really shouldn't dress up and go to Fantasy Fest. Of course exhibitionists love
it! A lot of the pictures end up on the internet. Just do a search for Fantasy Fest photos.

Fantasy Fest Pet Parade & Masquerade

For a change of pace during Fantasy Fest, the Pet Parade is kid-friendly, and pets are the center of attention. Pet owners dress up with their pets and parade around onstage to compete and donate money to pet charities. The best part of the show is the sidelines, where pets and owners mill around and wait their turn. The stage antics are silly and embarrassing to watch and you can't see anyway, so the real show is down in the crowd.

People dress their dogs up in the most ridiculously silly costumes, you have to laugh. There's probably a hot dog dog costume every year. Still funny! We love it!

The show starts out with the kid-pet combinations, then moves on to the adult-pet contestants. This year there was an adorable gray weimaramer as part of a tea party ensemble. Then there was a girl who shaved her dog in zebra patterns and dressed up as a lion, to represent animals of Africa! Totally spectacular!

The Fantasy Fest Pet Masquerade and Parade takes place at the Westin Resort on Front Street, behind the hotel facing the water. They put up a stage and try to keep people moving so nobody gets to stand in front and watch. Some people get there early and get tables at the restaurant in front of the stage. They can't see anything either because of all the people walking in front of them. Like I said, the best show is the sidelines where contestants are waiting for their turn on stage. You can actually talk to them while they wait, ask them about their costumes, congratulate them, pet the dogs. There was a chicken lady with a rooster in her arms, and there was a guy who entered some lobsters. For the most part, it's dogs.

Goombay, Fantasy Fest Kickoff

Friday and Saturday October 19 and 20 is Goombay, a street festival in Key West's Bahama Village. It's a celebration of Caribbean food plus some live music at night.

If you're from Key West, then Goombay is probably fun because you can walk up and down the street in Bahama Village and see everyone you know. Goombay activities include strolling up and down Petronia Street, which is lined with food vendors, then maybe stopping at the end and catching some live music from the sound stage. You're bound to run into everyone at some point in the long hot tunnel of food and the occasional African pottery vendor. It's a good chance to get out and see your neighbors.

For the visitor, Goombay offers the chance to crawl up and down Petronia Street rather than Duval Street. It's a change of pace from the regular hot sticky trudge. You can buy some $5 Arepas, which are from South America. You can buy a mushy stale soft pretzel for $3 (or $4 if you don't count your change). You can buy undercooked chicken on a stick for $5. Then you can top it all off with a $12 drink that's served in a pineapple. But do arepas qualify as Caribbean food? How about fried rice? As for a celebration of Caribbean culture, well it's hard to know where that is. Was it at the jerk chicken booth? Does buying food from a vendor count as celebrating? I feel more Caribbean just eating out at Jamaican Me Hungry on any given day.

On the other hand, the live music was great, and the warm up guy did a great job of getting everyone into the swing of things. Here he is. You definitely can't go wrong with live reggae!

The best thing about Goombay is that it's the official start of Fantasy Fest, which is the biggest week of the year in Key West. The crowds aren't here yet (60,000 people are supposed to arrive for Fantasy Fest), but many people attending Goombay are already in the spirit of things. You will see people prematurely wearing beads, some people in costume. Fantasy Fest is so much fun they just couldn't wait to get started. It's the spirit of Fantasy Fest and the live music that infuses Goombay with energy, not the elusive "Celebration of Caribbean Culture".