A place in Florida – Margaritaville is more an attitude than a place

There’s a place in Florida they call Margaritaville. It is more about a song, a singer, an attitude and a lifestyle than an alcoholic drink.

• The song of course is Margaretville.
• The singer, of course, is Jimmy Buffett.
• The attitude, of course, is live and let live.
• The lifestyle, of course, could be called stylish beach bum.

Key West has been Margaritaville since Buffett, a transplanted Mississippian, turned the city into the ‘Parrothead Capital of the USA.’ in 1977 with his wildly popular album. Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes Buffett has built the song into a cult following of Parrotheads earning him more than $100 million a year.

And this place in Florida, not to mention his previous ‘favorite sons’ of Ernest Hemingway, Tennessee Williams and President Harry Truman, will be eternally grateful. Jimmy Buffett is arguably the biggest draw Key West has ever had.

At one of his 20-30 concerts a year, Buffett was quoted as saying, ‘People ask me exactly where Margaritaville is. I say wherever you want it to be. If his songs have any measure, he would want it to be on the beach, a free and easy lifestyle so popular in the Florida Keys. Buffett, now in his 60s, now lives on the beach (and tony) Palm Beach.

The prevailing attitude in this part of Florida is live and let live. Over the last half century, the city has become a beacon for the gay and lesbian community, holding a nine-day Gay Pride Festival every spring.

The only time in recent memory the city was in a rage was when the US Border Patrol set up a barricade on US Highway 1 in 1982 to search for illegal drugs and immigrants in northbound traffic. The feds didn’t think about what that would do to tourist revenue (which, unsurprisingly, plummeted), and the city was furious.

Time to protest! In typical Key fashion, the City Council declared the Keys independent, calling it the Republic of the Shell. Of course, it was all a trick. After a minute of secession, the mayor surrendered to an official at the Naval Air Station, asking for $1 billion in “foreign aid.”

The trick was successful. The barricade was removed. But the Conch Republic name lives on in the hearts of many key residents.

Strait tourists don’t seem to mind the city’s reputation as a ‘rainbow’ city. They keep coming back, drawn by magnets like the Hemingway House and Museum, the Conch Train Tour, the Old Town Trolley, the Aquarium, the Shipwreck Historeum Museum, The Butterfly & Nature Conservancy, the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum, and the Little White House.

Harry Truman liked Key West. While he was president, he spent 175 days in the Little White House, now Florida’s only presidential museum. It has been visited by many presidents.

In recent years, recovered shipwreck treasures have become a major attraction, as displayed at the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum.

Hardly anyone who comes to Key West for the first time fails to visit the ‘Southernmost Point of the USA’. That’s the inscription on the buoy at the corner of South and Whitehead streets in Key West. But did you know that it really isn’t? This is why:

The true southernmost point is on Navy property west of the buoy marker. But a tourist attraction can’t be visited on Navy property, so the buoy will have to do, someone decided long ago. He took me there! And we won’t talk about the islands south and west of Key West.

If you don’t fly into Key West International Airport, it’s a long drive from Miami (130 miles). But it’s a memorable trip down the Overseas Highway, especially over the Seven-Mile Bridge. On both sides, as far as the eye can see, there is nothing but water. It’s like being on a ship on wheels.

The Overseas Highway was built on the platform and bridges of the Overseas Railroad, which Henry Flagler built in the early 20th century. But the 1935 Labor Day hurricane nearly destroyed part of the deck, so the railroad sold it along with the bridges to the state. The federal government built the Overseas Highway and completed it in 1938.

As you make your way down US 1 towards Key West (assuming you started in Miami), you’ll see Mile Markers that will tell you how far you are from Key West. They are a useful reminder of ‘Flagler’s Folly’, as his railroad was called, and form the basis of the house numbering system in this part of Florida.

Key West? You’ll know you’re headed in the right direction when you arrive at Mile Marker 100 near the Key Largo Post Office. When you get to Mile Marker 0 near the Key West Post Office, you’ll know it’s there.