The Gulf Coast
03 ~ 06 March 2024
The next day and all too soon, we head north out of the Keys again. We leave early to avoid the traffic on the assumption that a town that parties this hard is late to rise. We stop only for brunch at the rather good Buzzards Roost in Key Lago. It was packed at 11:30, with the bar doing brisk business. There are only inside tables available that suit us as the temperature is beginning to soar. With me on the bike and Richard in a natty Audi convertible with the top down, the arctic-grade aircon - the minimum standard in Florida it seems - is a godsend.
Our destination is Naples on the Gulf Coast and what a gem it turns out to be. If you like your holiday destinations to be ‘vibrant’ or ‘edgy’, Naples won’t be your thing. But if - like me - upscale informality is what you crave, Naples will win you over in a heartbeat.
We both agreed it was a bit like Santa Barbara on the Californian coast but revised this to be more Seahaven Island in The Truman Show, such is the glossy, controlled perfection. Forced to describe Naples in three words, I would say “rich”, “white” and “old” and if allowed a fourth as a prefix to the other three, that would be “very”.
Every building looks new or freshly painted, every blade of grass and hedge trimmed to the same length. There is zero litter on the well-scrubbed pavements. The bars and restaurants are numerous and welcoming, blessed by a golden sun that dips into the Gulf of Mexico leaving only a balmy breeze behind. There are not too many places I visit that I would like to live; it’s actually a fairly short list. The problem with all of them is they are just hopelessly, joylessly, laughably expensive. Naples is the same and now on this redundant list.
Further up the coast lie Saratoga and then St. Petersburg which are more like real life. These are still desirable places, make no mistake, with harbour fronts, museums - Saratoga even has an opera house - and there do appear to be real people doing real jobs. St. Petersburg is the fastest growing city in Florida with banks and insurance companies from the northeast moving in. The firms benefit from lower costs and employees no doubt enjoy a higher, overall standard of living. Naples, by contrast, is for waiters and the waited-on and not a place to be caught the wrong side of that line.
Richard is going back east across Florida to Port Saint Lucie. He leaves me with strict instructions to avoid conversations with strangers involving god, guns or Donald Trump. Soon, I see how sage this advice is.
After fifty miles of stop signs and cross streets every mile or so, the St. Petersburg urban sprawl gives way to 200 hundred miles of rural devastation. Everything - including the people - looks old, grey and broken. Endless strip malls where you can buy or sell a gun, interspersed with churches (usually quite smart buildings compared to the other properties) while bumper stickers indicate this region wears its political heart on its sleeve. This grim tableau is blurred by increasingly torrential rain as I reach my overnight stop at Crawfordville. There are no restaurants for miles around and so awful is the weather, no taxis are operating. Dinner is a pepperoni sub and a beer from the gas station convenience store.
It’s ‘Super Tuesday’, usually a pivotal moment in the US political cycle when 12 states select their presidential candidates. Although, this time, the results are largely a forgone conclusion. But the TV news anchors try to drum up some intrigue and tension for this goat rodeo by gabbling on about obscure facets of each state’s electoral process. As Razorlight accurately observed in ‘America’, “There’s nothing on the TV and nothing on the radio that means that much to me”. I turn in at eight o’clock. Super Tuesday, it is not.
10 miles south is Appalachia Bay and the start of the ‘Redneck Riviera’, hugging the coast all the way Pensacola and beyond. It doesn’t have the glitz of the resorts further south but there is mile after mile of soft white sand, budget accommodation and little else, suggesting it’s a reasonable place for a vacation for those of limited means and expectations. I’m staying over the bridge from Mobile, Alabama and wander down for dinner at Broudeaux’s Cajun Grill overlooking Mobile Bay. As soon as the sun dips, the automated blinds on the terrace descend to stop the diners themselves becoming dinner for giant mosquitoes.
Standard issue here seems to be a beard, beer-belly, baseball cap and a truck, making the name of the town - Daphne - seem a little incongruous. But friendliness abounds despite the gruff exteriors, the local orange IPA is superb and crawfish cakes with shrimp sauce is welcome after the dining atrocities of the previous night. And yes, duelling banjo and guitar music was playing in the background.
Next morning, the ‘Riveria’ continues into Mississippi. All the way from Biloxi to St. Louis Bay, another 50 miles of deserted, perfect beaches lapped by the gentle gulf tides, punctuated every so often with a cluster of bars & seafood restaurants.
