Queer Fresno

It had been two years since my last visit to Key West so I was eagerly awaiting this visit as the last few days before our departure went by.  Since discovering the island and its charms a few years ago I make as many trips out there as time and money permit.  I’m really convinced that it is a small piece of paradise and every day spent there is a gift.  So it is no wonder I put up with all the hassle of the travel to get out there and back.  Actually the trip out went fairly smoothly.  The most exciting part of the journey was in Dallas when Gary almost missed the plane to Miami due to his need to satisfy his twin desires for a smoke and a Starbucks.  I was standing at the gate, the last one there thinking about whether to leave him behind, when I saw him hurrying up the concourse, which fortunately made that choice no longer necessary.

We finally arrive in Key West late on a Friday evening after a long day’s travel and quickly secure a taxi to take us to the Island House.  Island House is likely one of the best gay resorts in the U.S.  It is men only and clothing optional, so one sees naked men almost as soon as you walk in the front door.  It has a 24 hour poolside café & bar, jacuzzi, sauna, workout room and upstairs the well-used “video room.”  In all the places I’ve stayed at over the years, it is one of my favorites.  Meeting up with our two friends who were also staying there, the four of us promptly headed out to our favorite gay bar.  Kwest is located on Duval Street about 15 minutes walk from the resort.  It’s greatest attraction is by far the go-go dancers.  Good-looking, scantily clad young men entertain the customers by cavorting around the bar and by coming up to say hello to each patron up close and personally - whenever one of them does so with me he always earns a $1 tip.  The customers can avail themselves of further entertainment by taking one of the young men into the back room for a private lap dance; a service which I have occasionally taken advantage of.  Now you can understand why this our favorite bar – there is certainly nothing like it in Fresno that’s for sure.  Anyway while we had a great time, it had been a long day so after a couple of hours we were all ready to head back to the resort and get some rest.

The next morning we had to get up early – at least relatively early, one of the cool things about the Key West trip is we stay on west coast time the whole time, so our days typically run from 10 am to 3 am – but today we had to start the day earlier than usual because we wanted to catch the 11 am trolley tour of the island.  Now Key West is well-known for its “Conch Train” island tours and the trolley tours are about the same.  But this one was special as the 11 am Saturday tour is the official “gay” tour of Key West.  The tour included specific gay points-of-interest along the way and to make the trip even more gay themed the trolley is festooned with rainbow flags from front to back.  In all our trips to the island we had never gone on the tour so this was something we were definitely looking forward to.  Our group of four arrived at the pick-up point with a few minutes to spare and once the trolley showed up a total of about 12 of us climbed aboard and off we went.  The driver/guide was great as he pointed out the various sites that had some sort of gay connection; he also kept us amused with various anecdotes involving famous or not so famous gays & lesbians who had spent time on the island over the years.  The funnest occurence, I’m sure it was not a scheduled part of the tour, was it so happened that just when we were passing by one of the many naval installations on the island, there was a group of sailors out in front, dressed in t-shirts and shorts getting ready to go for a run.  Of course to us they all looked gorgeous, so to a man we started hollering and waving at them.  With the rainbow flags on the trolley it wasn’t hard to figure out who we all were – most of the sailors stared blank-faced back at us as we passed by, although based on the size of the group alone I’d guess there were one or two of them who secretly wished they could join us.  When the tour came to its end the four of us all thanked driver for a great time.  When he learned we were staying at Island House he offered to give us a ride back.  Talk about service!  That was our big adventure for the day, for the rest of the day we took it easy, hung around the resort, went out to dinner, and finally headed off for another night at the bar.  All the same cute young men were there that had been there the previous night.  We wound up tipping them quite a few dollars since we stayed almost until closing.  Finally though it was time to call it a night and we stumbled back to the resort.

The next day started out a lot more slowly for two reasons, one being we didn’t have to be anywhere and the other was a rain shower decided to pass over the island so the morning turned out to be pretty wet.  The rain ended just in time for this day’s big event, the Island House was hosting a pool party being sponsored by ManHunt, the well-known on-line gay dating service.  They had two of their video stars there to host the event, both of them were really good-looking guys which everyone appreciated.  The highlight of the party was a contest where they gave away various adult toy prizes for guys with the biggest dick, nicest ass, etc.; all judged by the cheers from the many naked guys hanging around the pool.  The whole afternoon was a lot of fun.  That evening we went out to dinner at my favorite restaurant on the island.  Jack Flats is a really cool sports bar on Duval Street, as well as being one of the biggest I’ve seen, and it has a great atmosphere where both gays and straights are comfortable mixing.  It also serves the best fish and chips I’ve ever had so I never fail to stop there at least once.  We all had a nice meal and then strolled around a bit until it was time to head to the bar.  We were there for only a short while when I spotted one of the young men who had become a particular favorite of mine.  He had come up to me each of the two previous nights and he was very pleasant to talk to – as well as to fondle repeatedly.  So tonight when he came by I proposed we go visit the back room, an invitation he readily accepted.   I knew I had chosen well as he was really a delightful young man; he gave me a great lap dance which I thoroughly enjoyed and I was pleased to give him a handsome and well-deserved tip.  Again we ended-up closing the bar, wishing the boys a goodnight and promising to return for one more night.

Monday was to be our last full day on the island.  Today I was going to indulge in a brand new adventure.  One of my friends likes to go jet-skiing and he had invited me to come along with him several times previously - so today I was finally going to take him up on it.  This was something I had never done before, so I was really looking forward to it.  We weren’t just going to rent jet-skis, we were going to go on a tour around the whole island which would last about two hours.  A 20 minute walk got us to the beach on the far southwestern side of the island were the jet-ski rental place was.  It was a small outfit run by a couple of guys with a dozen jet-skis.  After filling out a ream of forms for the rental agreement, insurance coverage, safety instructions, etc.; we then had to wait for a while until it was time for the tour to start.  There ten of us going on the tour as our guide called us over; we were each issued a floatation vest and told to wade out into the water and climb on to one of the jet-skis.  When it was my turn I managed to get on one without too much trouble even though it felt a little clumsy.  Once the jet-ski was cast-off I started the engine and started feeling my way around in maneuvering the vehicle.  They are actually very simple to operate: a start/stop button for the engine, a hand throttle and handle bars for turning.  The most important thing to remember was it had no brake.  When you released the throttle the jet-ski would fairly quickly coast to a stop; but you had to be sure to allow sufficient room for any needed coasting.  It did have a speedometer so it was cool to watch it as I got comfortable going faster and faster.  The guide gave us a few minutes to cruise around near the beach to get used to driving the jet-skis – then we were off, headed for the harbor on the northwest side of the island.

Now for the first time I really had to go fast to keep up with everyone.  The water was just choppy enough that I was doing some serious bouncing up and down as I hit the swells.  Even though it was some work I was able to keep up with the rest without too much difficulty, so I felt pretty good about that.  Eventually we arrived off the harbor.  The guide gave a quick little history lesson about the area while we all listened and looked.  I had been to the harbor many times but the view was very different from a couple hundred yards out in the water.  Once the talk was over our guide led us slowly through the harbor and eventually we wound up in an isolated area on the north side of the island.  It was explained to us that this spot was very shallow - only a few feet deep - so the boats stayed away from it, which made it perfect as a jet-ski area.  The guide told us we would have next 30 minutes free to run about to our heart’s content; just cautioning us not to stray too far away.

The area was roughly a square mile in size so there was plenty of room for all of us.  Off I went, zooming about the water’s surface, becoming a little bolder with each pass until finally I reached the jet-ski’s top speed of 50 mph.  It was an exhilarating feeling skimming along so fast so close to the water.  The half-hour went by pretty quickly and I could see our guide was waiving for us to join back up into a group.  When we were reassembled he led the way, continuing our trek around the island.  We eventually passed under the bridge for the Overseas Highway and were technically back on the Atlantic side of the island.  Now it was just a long run the length of the island back to the place we started.  The water on this side was definitely rougher so I bounced up and down the whole way back; at least I felt more comfortable going faster so I had no problem keeping up with the others.  At last we reached the beach and we all circled around as one-by-one the guide remoored the jet-skis.  Once I was safely fastened to the mooring buoy, I slithered off of the jet-ski and waded back up to the beach to join my friend.  It had been a really fun adventure, I was glad I had finally tried it.  Of course we were both soaked from head to toe in sea water; so the two of us sloshed our way back to the resort.  Once there I immediately jumped into the shower to try and get as much of the sticky salt water off as I could.

I felt a little cleaner as I called Gary to see what we would do for the evening; and upon reaching him learned that he was down by the harbor with our other friend.  I said I would come over and join them so I set out for that end of the island.  I was aware it was getting close to sunset and I had yet to see the sunset from the island so I thought now would be a good chance.  Reaching Mallory Square at the harbor, I found Gary and my friend and we found ourselves a spot by the water to watch the sun go down.  It was quite a popular sight to see, as evidenced by the hundreds of others who had come to watch as well.  I had remembered to bring my camera and took a lot of pics.  One of the best of them I have posted with this blog so you are seeing what the sun looks like, as observed from Mallory Square in Key West, as it sets into the Gulf of Mexico.

With the show over the three of us headed back towards the resort.  We discussed where we wanted to have dinner tonight, but I was dead-tired and didn’t really care.  It turned out they were almost as tired and we wanted to have some energy for going to the bar later so we wound up deciding to have dinner at the resort.  (As soon as I got back I took another shower as I was still feeling sticky from my ocean adventure.)  By the time we had dinner and rested for a while I was reenergized enough to head out to the bar for our last night out on the island.  Since it was Monday night it was much less busy at the bar.  We had gotten to know the young men somewhat well by now, so between the four of us we spent a lot of time with them saying how much we had enjoyed our visit and stuffing copious amounts of dollar bills into their skimpy briefs.  Finally it was time to leave as tomorrow was to be a full travel day.  So we bid the boys good-bye and headed back to the resort.

The next day we got up, packed, had a bite to eat, wished our friends a safe trip home and headed for the airport.  Key West International had built a new departure terminal since our last visit.  I remembered the tiny waiting area we’d crowded into the last time; this new one was much larger so we were able to wait much more comfortably until they called our plane.  So back we went, flying back to Miami and then Dallas and finally Fresno.  The trip wasn’t too bad, the flights were on time and the crowds reasonable, which is about all one can hope for these days.  The worst part of the long day was going out into the 40 deg temps in Fresno after the nice weather in Florida.  The car was actually iced over so we had to wait and shiver in the car with the engine running until it had heated up enough to melt the ice on the windshield!  It had been a great vacation to one of my most favorite places.  Whether it is one year or two years from now to I look forward to my next visit to Key West.

RA