The Torches, Ramrod, Summerland and Cudjoe Keys

The Torches

Leaving Big Pine Key, you'll cross bridge #22 over North Pine Channel, a small railroad fill, then bridge #23 over South Pine Channel, and on to Little Torch Key.  The modern road at this point is on the railroad right of way - the original road a few miles north of here along No Name Key, Watson Road, over Bogey Channel, and across Big Pine Key on Watson Blvd.  The road would cross Pine Channel about a mile and a half north of here and onto Little Torch Key.  From there it turned south and joined back up with the railroad on Little Torch.

The Torch Keys are named for the torchwood tree that grows here.  The torchwood tree is named for its unusual property of burning even while wet and green.  There is little documented history of the Torch Keys.

Once on Little Torch Key, at the first intersection, just to the left, is the entrance to the Little Palm Island resort.  Nothing is here but the welcome center, the actual resort is on a palm-coverd island called Munson Island about two and a half miles south of here.  LIttle Palm Island is an ultra-exclusive secluded resort with rooms from many hundred to several thousand dollars per night.  Past the Little Palm Island welcome center is where most of the residential development of Little Torch Key is found.

Another quarter of a mile down the road is where the new road meets the old road at around MM 28.2.  If you turn right here on SR-4A, you can follow it up about a mile and a half and see the other side of where the old road came in from Big Pine Key.  The bridge is long gone, however.

Cross the Torch Key Viaduct at MM 28 to Middle Torch Key.  The portion of Middle Torch Key that the railroad and road crossed, and still crosses, is mostly fill attached to the southern end of Middle Torch Key.  There is one intersection on Middle Torch Key, and if you want to explore, turn right here onto Middle Torch Road.

The Keys are full of "roads to nowhere".  Some of these are remnants of the old road, with the best example being the southern edge of Sugarloaf Key.  Some were built to service particular facilities, like the road to Boot Key.  Some were built in anticipation of future development that ever quite got off the ground.  The best examples of these are on the northern ends of the Torch Keys, Cudjoe Key and Sugarloaf Key.  If you make the turn onto Middle Torch Road, the road winds nearly four miles north with about a dozen scattered homes on Middle Torch Key.  A little over two miles up, you can make a left turn onto Dorn Road to Big Torch Key.  This road has some small developments in the first two miles or so, then another five or six houses another mile down the road.  But it's not done.  The road winds another two and a half miles before petering out on Big Torch Key, with another one or two houses up there.  All told, nearly eight miles of road exist on Middle and Big Torch Keys with nearly nothing there.  An old map of Big Torch Key I have has the far north end platted out - 1st Ave, 2nd Ave, etc, but these plans never became reality and Big Torch Key remains a great big, mostly empty, island with a very long road to nowhere.

Ramrod Key

At MM 27.5, cross bridge #25 (Torch-Ramrod) to Ramrod Key.  Ramrod Key is named for a shipwreck that occurred on the reef a few miles offshore here.  The first intersection here on the left is West Indies Drive, where all the residential development on Ramrod Key is.  On the left hand side just past here, is where the Looe Key dive center is.  Looe Key is a few miles south of Ramrod Key and is one of the most popular spots to dive in the lower Keys.  There is a convenience store here and a gas station.  Just ahead on the right is one of the most popular bars and restaurants to stop on the way through the Keys.  Boondock's Grille has decent food and cold beer.  For some reason they have a miniature golf course here too.  You can't miss it, it's a wooden building on the right with a thatch roof.

Summerland Key

Head out of Ramrod Key at MM 26 over bridge #26 (Niles Channel) to Summerland Key.  Summerland Key is a highly residential island with little early history.  The island was unspoiled and undeveloped through the end of World War II, when Henry Hudgins bout the island from the Niles family and began development.  There is not much here for the traveler - some commercial development on the Ocean Side between MM 25 and MM 24 which consists of a few professional buildings, a couple of banks, some gas stations and a post office.  Closer to MM 24 are a few restaurants and the Mote Marine Laboratory.  The far western end is slightly less built up.

There is a private airstrip on Summerland Key and there are homes that butt right up to it that you can literally fly in and out of.  Summerland Key is also home to the Mile Marker 24 Band and was also the home of singer/songwriter Fred Neil, probably best known for his song "Everybody's Talkin'", most famously recorded by Harry Nilsson in 1968.

Leave Summerland Key at MM 23.6 and cross Kemp's Channel (bridge #27) to Cudjoe Key.

Cudjoe Key

Cudjoe Key is split north-south by the Overseas Highway.  To the south of the highway is almost exclsively residential, with a huge concentration of people and homes south of the highway between Kemp's Channel and MM 22.  There are many places in the Keys where street names are named after fish, and many more where they have pirate-themed names.  Here there are both.  Wahoo, Snapper, Bonito.  Jolly Roger, Doubloon, Galleon, and the "main" street, Spanish Main Drive.  Somewhere farther up the Keys, one of the pirate neighborhoods has a "Pieces of Eight Road", my favorite of the pirate roads.

At MM 22.6 on the south (Ocean) side, is the Square Grouper Bar and Grill.  I don't know much about the food (they keep strange hours here), but the Square Grouper has some great T-shirts.  "Square grouper" is a nickname for the bales of marijuana that Keys fishermen would occasionally fish out of the sea.  At one time there was so much marijuana coming into and out of the Keys that drug boats would simply toss their cargo overboard if in danger of being caught. 


Twin Fat Albert blimps on Cudjoe Key

At MM 21.5 on the north (Gulf) side is Blimp Road.  Blimp Road leads up to an Air Force facility that is a satellite of Joint Base Homestead.  This is the home of two blimps casually referred to as "Fat Albert".  One or the other Fat Albert is usually up in good weather keeping eyes and ears over the Florida Strait, watching and listening for illegal drugs and immigrants crossing the Strait from Cuba and the Caribbean into the Keys.  In addition, the blimps broadcast TV Marti to Havana, similar to the radio Marti broadcast from Boot Key.  The government of Cuba jams the transmission though, so it isn't received in Havana.  In 1991, one of the Fat Albert blimps broke off it's tether, drifted across Florida Bay and crashed in the Everglades, where it sat for months before they salvaged it.

At MM 21 is another residential development on the south (ocean) side.  At MM 20.3 you'll cross Bow Channel to Sugarloaf Key.