We’ve officially been living in Key West for one week now, and we haven’t gotten lost in the 24-7 nightlife of Duval Street or attacked by any of the many lizards and chickens roaming the island. Matt’s even found himself a job. I’d consider that a successful first week, wouldn’t you?

But what a week it’s been! After our visit home, we made the loooong drive from MD to FL with a loaner truck from Matt’s uncle stuffed to the brim with stuff we’d need for the house (yard tools, paint supplies, tools, etc). Google told us the trip would take us around 18 hours, so we left at 4am and started ticking off the states as we headed South. Originally our plan was to do 3 hour driving shifts, just like we would do an overnight trip on the boat, however we both forgot how much we hate I-95 and found ourselves shortchanging our shifts as the day wore on. I think we were down to switching every 90 minutes or so, which was timed perfectly for when we were in need of a bathroom break. Damn coffee. We must have hit every rest stop along I-95 from North Carolina thru Florida. We ended up making it to Ft. Lauderdale in just over 16 hours, even with all those stops. No shocker here that Sansbury time trumped Google.

Since we enjoyed the drive SO much (insert sarcasm here), we decided to spend just one day on the boat before turning around and doing it all over again on the final leg to the Keys. To say we were dreading it would be an understatement. We’ve been on a boat for six months! No driving! My right shin was killing me from working the pedals and my butt was sore from all the sitting. Pretty funny, huh?

Because the back of the truck was already filled to the brim with house stuff, we had to buck up and rent a moving truck to get the rest of our things down to the house. We had cleared the boat of most of our belongings when we returned from the Bahamas and and shoved everything (rather haphazardly) into a small 4’x6′ storage unit.

I think it says a lot when you can ft your whole life into less than 200 cubic feet of space. Sigh…

Matt was wondering if the 10′ rental truck would be big enough to fit all the stuff from our storage unit. Um…. I think we’re fine. You could stack all of those bins in the back of the truck and still fit a dining room table for six in there. Probably should have went with a van.

The drive from Lauderdale to Key West took about 5 hours. Two of those hours were spent on Rt.1 from Lauderdale thru the sprawl of Miami. Once we get a SunPass (like an EZ Pass, but for some unknown reason, Florida has to be different), we can hop on the turnpike and should be able to shave the drive down to about 3 hours or so. Once we sell the boat, we’ll have no reason to come up to the mainland at all (except to the airport every now and then), a thought that makes me very, very happy. The Keys are awesome. Ft. Lauderdale/Miami is not.

So…. here it is! Our new house! Isn’t it cute? Exactly what I picture when I think of Key West. We absolutely love it… all 780 sq. ft of it, which feels HUGE compared to the boat!
The past week has been spent organizing, organizing, organizing! When we packed up the boat, we basically threw everything and anything into whatever bin/bag/box we had on hand. Spices were mixed with socks. Office supplies were co-mingling with toilet paper. It was a hot mess and pretty much threw me into a meltdown whenever I tried to find anything.
Our Key West couch. The new one is on order, but for now, these will do just fine….
This week we’ve also been doing a lot of painting. SO. MUCH. PAINTING. A previous tenant must have been an artist, because both bedroom ceilings and the pantry were, uh….. artistically enhanced? Some people will probably look at these pictures and think these murals (?) are cool/charming/beautiful, which they ARE, just not our style. So, they gotta go.