The Rhythm of My Story: Another Day in Key West Paradise

The weather app said we should expect rain this afternoon so we got up quickly and headed down to the airport shuttle by 8:30. When we got to downtown Key West we got tickets for the Old Town Trolley so we could see the places we wanted to experience without worrying about parking. Then we walked over to Truman's Little White House. We really knew nothing about it except someone highly recommended it. We had an excellent guide and I learned so much. Truman spent eleven working vacations on Key West. The home has been restored to the Truman years.

We got on the trolley and headed to the Hemingway House, but first we went by the Kermit Key Lime Pie Shop.

My mother got me to read "A Farewell to Arms" when I was a teenager. She loved Hemingway. She signed all her letters to family with P.O.M. She got that from a character in a Hemingway novel who signed her letters that way and it stood for Poor Old Mom.

Hemingway lived on Key West with his second of four wives. He wrote 70% of his body of work while on Key West. He loved cats, especially those with extra toes. There are now 50 cats living there, descendants of Hemingway's cats. About half of them have extra toes. Here are two cats sleeping on Hemingway's bed.

When we finished at Hemingway's house it was lunchtime. We went to Santiago's Bodega, a tapas restaurant and another recommendation. It was amazing. I had food there that I will dream about.

Back on the trolley we headed to the southernmost point. There was a very long line of people waiting to get their picture taken at the point. I took a picture of the line.

We really got off at this stop to visit the butterfly conservatory. By this time we were so hot and sticky we almost quit our tour but it would have been a mistake. For $10 a piece we walked through a tropical wonderland with beautiful birds...