Where the Caribbean and America meet

As a Canadian, I had no idea I could be sitting on a tropical island within a three-day’s drive from home. I’d been to South Florida many times, but never to the Keys. I’d heard of them but was never too inspired to go. To my northern imagination, a palm tree was a palm tree was a palm tree.

My assumptions were shattered when I visited Key West with my dad. We’d driven to my grandparent’s condo in North Palm Beach from Toronto and he suggested we make the additional drive south after a few days’ rest. I agreed and we headed out on the four-and-a half-hour trip by car.

The first thing that struck me along the way was that less than half an hour outside Miami we found ourselves on a two-lane highway with fewer and few buildings in sight. The everglades sprung up and swept out in all directions. I felt a sense of impending remoteness and natural beauty similar to how I feel the first time visiting Ontario cottage country after a long winter in Toronto.

We crossed the bridge to Key Largo and I caught my first glimpse of the emerald and turquoise waters of the Caribbean Sea. We drove through Key Largo and the land slowly gave way to nothing but road and ocean. We passed through Islamorada and Duck Key. Along the Seven Mile Bridge of “True Lies” fame, pelicans soared beside us and people biked and fished. My dad mentioned that he thought the Keys had once tried to form their own country and the idea didn’t sound that far-fetched given unusualness of the surroundings compared to the rest of the continental U.S.

We got to Big Pine Key and soon after we arrived in Key West. We checked into our motel, had a short rest, and went out exploring. We walked along Whitehead and Duval St. and I noticed old, French-style houses with large verandas and outdoor ceiling fans as well as Spanish architecture. We happened across the Southernmost Point of the U.S. and stopped, 90 miles from Havana.

The Point was marked by a ten-foot, brightly painted buoy on the sidewalk. I looked out over the Straits of Florida towards Cuba and thought about the Caribbean as a region, about all the trade and history and cultures it contained. How many merchant sailors, naval officers and travelers must have passed through this place over the centuries? I knew I was still in the U.S., but it felt like the tropics. It’s no wonder the locals – ‘Conchs’ as they’re called – had wanted to start their own country.