courtney & eric ~ we’re on a boat ~ key west florida wedding photographer

I bought a bicycle once. 

 

Call it pre-midlife crisis. Call it impulse. Call it needing a reason to wear padded spandex shorts in public. 

 

And since I drive everywhere for weddings, I realized I could take the Shiny New Overpriced Bike with me on road trips and still ride and get exercise and all of that sounded like a great idea. It was a great idea, mostly. I skipped riding through the Everglades on this trip, because all I could envision was someone finding my bike on the side of the road somewhere and an alligator in the bushes choking on an expensive bike helmet. 

So I get to Key West. I meet Courtney and Eric, and all of the awesome wedding party.  We bond over excessive amounts of mimosas, and then hop on a trolley and ride around Key West. Here’s where I pause to say that Courtney, Eric, and most of the wedding party are cops. From Virginia, Jersey, New York, Southern Florida. Hilarious, loud, inappropriate, no filter. And then you add me into that group, stir in some rum and Key Lime pie, and then stick us all on a trolley and drive us around Key West. That’ll end well. 

I don’t remember why it was exactly that the guy in the little sports car flipped us all off, but it happened. And my only regret is not having my camera hanging outside of the trolley when the barrage of hands flew out of the trolley windows, and the cranky gentleman in his little car got a warm and hearty response from us. I’m fairly sure the trolley driver was going to choke from laughter, but I wasn’t worried about it. We had cops on board. Surely someone could taze him back to breathing again or some such. 

I digress. 

So the next day after the wedding, still wondering what exactly happened the night before on Duval Street, I thought it would be a great idea to bike around the island. Sun, salt air, exercise. Ahhhh. 

And it really was a great ride, until there was a traffic jam. I decided to be cool and ride up onto the sidewalk instead of  waiting behind all of the traffic which, in theory, was a good idea. Only my back tire thought it was a stupid idea, so it decided to stay on on the street, while the front tire, the bicycle, and the large dude in spandex and a nifty helmet was now on the sidewalk going faster than necessary in that situation. 

I’m not sure how it happened, but all I remember is the bike just stopped. That whole “Once an object is in motion, it stays in motion” thing came into play here. The bike stopped, I was shot over the handlebars Superman style into some lovely tropical vegetation, all about 5 feet from a long line of cars I was in a hurry to get around. There was no cool way out of this. I could actually hear people laughing from their cars, all while I was still hanging out in the shrubs checking out the different kinds of landscaping mulch they use in the Keys. 

I got up, bleeding from my elbow and a huge gash in my leg, straightened the handlebars, then turned around and with all of the grandeur I could muster, I bowed to the entire line of cars. Which in turn honked, waved, clapped, and took cell phone shots of the guy that just pulled an epic fail while wearing padded spandex shorts. 

 

Of course Courtney and Eric got photos of it and the entire story the same day, and I promised her I’d tell the story on their blog. 

 

 

To Courtney, Eric, the entire awesome wedding party, the trolley driver, everyone at  Fury catamaran in Key West, and even to you, gentleman with anger issues in the little, tiny car, sincere thanks for an absolutely wonderful and most memorable trip to the Keys. 

 

Much love, 

 

B