Language:	English
Currency:	US Dollar
Ship’s Docking:	Hilton Marina; a 5-minute walk to Mallory Square and Front Street.

Key West, the southernmost city in the continental U.S., is the largest and most vibrant of a chain of tiny islands called the Florida Keys that are scattered, like a string of pearls, south of Miami. Closer to Cuba than to Miami (with respective distances of 90 and 150 miles), Key West, dubbed the "Conch Republic," is a very popular destination and easily one of the funkiest and wackiest ports of call in all of cruising.

Key West earned its Conch moniker in 1982. Then, residents of this free-spirited place tried to secede from the U.S. after the Border Patrol, in an effort to catch smugglers and illegal aliens, created a roadblock at Key Largo. The roadblock was a disaster for tourism. As such, the island's then-mayor declared war on America -- and then required more than $1 million in foreign aid. No funds were forthcoming and Key West backtracked.

Key West was first settled in the 1820s and considered America's richest city per capita in 1886. It is compact (about the size of New York's Central Park), laidback and kitschy-cute, filled to the brim with gingerbread cottages, Victorian mansions, widow's walks, sidewalk cafes, T-shirt shops galore, colorful and moderately famous local characters -- and plenty of historical richness along winding white-picket-fenced streets. It may be hard, initially, to appreciate Key West's charm, particularly for cruise travelers who are disgorged at the confluence of ticky-tacky tourist shops on Lower Duval Street. But it's an easy place to explore -- and walking (or cycling) through smaller side streets will reveal quite a lovely city.

Famous residents include Ernest Hemingway (you can visit his house-cum-museum, the place where he wrote novels in the 1930s -- and visit his favorite pubs-cum-tourist attractions). You can also walk in the footsteps of President Truman, who lived on Front Street.