ISLAMORADA — In the late 1970s, Sam Wampler was tasked with finding a home base for a new Boy Scouts of America program that provided adventures on the high seas for scouts from around the country.

Wampler, at the time the camping director for the Boy Scouts’ Miami region, found the spot he was looking for in 1980 on the site of a rundown hotel at the southwest tip of Lower Matecumbe.

Two-hundred-and-fifty-thousand scouts later, Florida Sea Base has become a staple of the Boy Scouts of America and a key player in the economic life of Lower Matecumbe Key and surrounding islands.

“We are literally influencing families across this nation,” said Keith Douglass, the Sea Base facilities director.

Florida Sea Base won’t officially turn 30 until this summer. But on Monday the Lower Matecumbe institution was scheduled to hold its birthday party early to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the Boy Scouts of America.

Wampler passed away seven years ago, but wife Sharon remembers that first year, when she guesses 1,000 to 2,000 scouts visited the base.

According to local lore, during the summer of 1980 Sea Base staff had to fend off patrons of the old Toll Gate Inn, who were unaware that the former brothel and seedy watering hole had been converted into a place that could safely be called, well, more wholesome.

Over time those Tollgate customers disappeared entirely and Sea Base flourished. New dormitories were built, as well as an administrative building and conference center. In 1982 the scouts acquired the 105-acre Munson Island off Big Pine Key. Then in 2001 the scouts opened the Brinton Environmental Center on Summerland Key.

All are used in the various Sea Base adventures programs, which include multi-day sails, dive training, fishing excursions and primitive camping on Munson.

According to Sea Base officials, today more than 10,000 scouts a year descend upon the Lower Matecumbe locale, which is one of only three High Adventure bases run by the Boy Scouts of America.

Douglass says all those people mean big dollars to the local community. The scouts often visit local attractions like Theater of the Sea and the Florida Keys History of Diving Museum. If their families come for a visit they stay at local lodges. And Sea Base does a lot of its buying locally.

“We spent over $30,000 in bait alone just last year and that’s all local,” Douglass said.

Meanwhile, Sharon Wampler says she can’t believe how big the Sea Base program has grown over the past 30 years.

“Sam is up there just laughing at the whole thing, happy about it,” she said.

rsilk@keysnews.com

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Agenda Summery

The tour is approx 6 miles, with frequent stops. This is not a race and we will go at a comfortable pace.
Bring your own bike. If you don’t have one, ask your concierge or contact Back Country Cowboy 305-517-4177 backcountrycowboy.com for rates.

The tour is free. If you would like, a donation will be collected for local youth sport program
Bring water and use sun screen.

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At one point Batten was in 6 different bands, playing everything from straight ahead rock, to metal, fusion, and funk. A major turning point came when she was selected from more than 100 guitarists to play in Michael Jackson’s band, resulting in 3 world tours over 10 years and playing in front of almost 5 million people. Spring of 98’ saw Batten joining legendary guitarist Jeff Beck, resulting in two CDs (“Who Else,” “You Had It Coming”) and corresponding world tours. Says the Cleveland Plain Dealer of Jennifer’s Rock N Roll Hall of Fame performance honoring Les Paul: “The evening’s showstopper was Jennifer Batten…amazing and technically dazzling.”

Vicki Genfan has captivated both US and international audiences with a unique style that defies description. Winner of the prestigious 2008 Guitar Player’s “Guitar Superstar”Award, Vicki has developed a sound all her own. As Joel Selvin of the San Francisco Chronicle writes, “Genfan doesn’t just play guitar. She also slaps it, tickles it, fondles it, scratches it, tosses it around in her hands and coaxes all kinds of unlikely, rhythmic sounds out of the otherwise simple instrument.”

Vicki is that rare artist whose live performances are becoming legendary among fans. Genfan’s newest release is “UnCovered.”

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The cause of the fire appeared to be accidental, according to assistant Islamorada Fire Chief Bruce Stoll. He reported that the fire started on the outside of the building and spread into a stairwell. Key Largo Volunteer Fire Department Chief Sergio Garcia said firefighters had the fire under control by 1 p.m. but were checking the building for flare-ups and were removing part of a stairwell. Fire and rescue crews from Key Largo to Big Pine Key responded.

Jim Costello, resort manager at Cheeca, said a demolition crew accidentally started the fire while cutting into a metal roof with a cutting torch. Sparks from the torch flew and accidentally caught the old thatch roof on fire, Costello said. Costello said the fire was contained quickly and won’t impact the resort’s plans to reopen by the end of the year.

Zirkelbach said the fire started somewhere along the northeast corner of the building opposite the starting point of the New Year’s Eve fire that severely damaged the structure and closed the resort. Zirkelbach said he heard reports that a welder’s torch ignited the fire somewhere on the fourth floor, but fire officials would not confirm it. Wagner said it appeared the fire could have started on a long thatch roof overhanging what used to be an outside dining area on the side of the building facing the ocean.

A thatched overhang on the north side of the building was the source of the first fire that is believed to have been sparked by an ember. The main building housed administrative offices, a lobby, two restaurants, bars, a conference center and 49 guest rooms.

“I’m just really distraught, how it could catch fire again,” said Wagner, who since the first fire has worked with other Keys fire officials to push for more stringent permit requirements for fire retardant on thatched structures. Wagner said his department hadn’t pushed for Cheeca to check its retardant on the ocean-side thatch, which was partially burned in the first fire, because Cheeca had planned to demolish and rebuild the structure. “They were going to demolish the building, so there was no reason to push the issue,” he said. “Now it’s just a matter of a big mess and drama.”

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Big Betsey, once deemed the second-most photographed icon in the Florida Keys by Eastman Kodak, behind only the Southernmost Point,  could soon migrate back into public view. Betsey, better known simply as The Giant Lobster of Islamorada, has been absent for months from her longtime post outside the former Treasure Village on Plantation Key. “We’re working on it,” Mia Berry said of plans for the re-emergence of the family-owned fiberglass sculpture.

With its former home having been transformed into a school, the lobster has been hidden away in a storage yard off the Overseas Highway. Within the next few weeks, however, the giant crustacean, 30 feet tall by 40 feet long, will re-emerge, luring passersby to the Rain Barrel Artisan Village on Plantation Key.

Rain Barrel Gallery LLC and Big Betsy owners Dennis and Mia Berry finalized a 10-year lease with a purchase option on Monday, Dennis Berry and Rain Barrel co-owner Mike Forster said. They did not disclose terms of the deal.

“We are doing this because we feel in this economy we need to generate more trips to the Rain Barrel for our tenants,” Forster said. “We figured that the lobster was a great draw. It always has been a great draw. It was a great draw at Treasure Village and it will be at the Rain Barrel.” The statue, 40 feet long and 30 feet high, is a detailed, biologically accurate depiction of a female spiny lobster. Betsey has appeared on television shows and in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. A Web site on roadside attractions declares it the largest non-inflatable crustacean statue in America.

In the 1980s, sculptor Richard Blaze spent five years assembling and painting the giant lobster at his workspace on Coco Plum in Marathon. By the time he finished, the business that had commissioned the lobster was out of business. The lobster then was acquired by Treasure Village owner Tom Vellanti and his family to be used as a landmark for the shopping plaza near mile marker 87.

When Treasure Village became a charter school in 2006, Betsey needed a new home. The lobster was disassembled and removed from public view for refurbishment and possible sale. Plans to move it to an Upper Matecumbe Key business stalled. Betsey even showed up on the eBay auction site last year. No suitable bids were received; the lobster once had a list price of $400,000.

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It’s unclear how the filing will impact operations at the property, located at mile marker 84.5. But news of the legal action brought reaction from Islamorada’s Mayor Cathi Hill. “In conjunction with the events at Cheeca, this could not have come at a worse time,” Hill said. A New Year’s eve fire closed down Cheeca Resort and Islamorada officials and business leaders are still are unsure when the tony oceanfront resort will reopen.

Holiday Isle is also well-know for its charter boat row, where deep sea fishing boats line up for guests drawn from Holiday Isle and other resort properties throughout the Upper Keys. Charter captains, already on edge over an uncertain future for the resort and marina, talked Friday about their concerns with a weak economy and fewer people willing to shell out hundreds of dollars for a day of fishing. “I don’t know what our future is right now,” said Capt. J.R. Rudzin of the Captain JR charter boat.

Ceebraid paid $98 million for Holiday Isle in 2006 with plans to raze the famous party spot and its numerous onsite bars and erect an ancient-Greek-themed, 151-unit ultra-luxury resort called Ocanos. Starting prices were advertised at $1.2 million for a one-bedroom unit. That was in March 2007 and within months of buying the oceanfront property at mile marker 84.5, Schlesinger issued a press release saying 25 percent of the units were under contract to be sold. But under Florida law, buyers have 15 days to back out of pre-sale contracts, and that’s exactly what most of Ocanos’ initial investors did.

Schlesinger, who, along with other Holiday Isle representatives, did not return phone calls for this report, moved on to plan B. In April 2007, he announced plans to knock down Holiday Isle and replace it with a “five-star” hotel. That never happened either and on Jan. 28 a company that lent money for Ocanos to Schlesinger, his partners and up to six limited-liability corporations filed the foreclosure notice. VII Holiday Isle Funding, LLC, is the plaintiff in the foreclosure filing. It’s a subsidiary of the global investment firm Starwood Capital. James Robinson, the plaintiff’s attorney, said he isn’t authorized by his client to comment on the case.

It’s not clear how many people work at the Holiday Isle complex on Windley Key, but the resort’s bars, restaurants and hotels form a major business hub in the village of Islamorada. Capt. Rudzin has been renting a slip at the marina for 11 years. He pays about $875 a month, which he says is a good price, and a rate he’s not sure he’ll be offered if he has to move to another marina. “I don’t know where we turn from here,” Rudzin said.

Mayor Hill said she remains optimistic someone else may come along when the economy gets better to not only preserve the resort, which is said to have originated the iconic Rum Runner cocktail, but also to improve it. “Economic conditions are cyclical, and I have no doubt Holiday Isle and Cheeca will come back better than ever,” Hill said.

When Schlesinger first announced his plans for Ocanos, condotels were the hot real estate investment. The concept was that resort hotels would sell condominium units, purchased by investors, and then rent those out to paying guests. The hotel management company and the investor owners would share the rental income.

In the Keys, many landmark properties were sold to deep-pocket developers who hoped to redevelop dated hotels and motels into condotels. One of the most ambitious projects targeted Holiday Isle, and the $98 million paid set a record at the time.

The foreclosure notice lists VII Holiday Isle Funding as owed “$77 million in principal and other sums due, plus accrued interest, reasonable attorney fees, costs and other expenses.”

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Monroe County Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Becky Herrin says a caller reported seeing flames burning through the roof of the main lodge building just before 10 p.m. Wednesday and that the fire was under control before midnight. The cause of the fire is under investigation, but it apparently started in palm thatching that was attached to the main building.

The resort has nearly 200 guestrooms and was fully occupied. Some rooms during the winter start at around $269 a night. Damage to the hotel is still being assessed. Guests in the main building were relocated to other nearby hotels.

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Sea Oats Beach, Islamorada - after Wilma

The vulnerable section of the Overseas Highway along Sea Oats Beach was exposed anew when Hurricane Ike brushed the Florida Keys. Moderate tropical-storm force winds and a 2- to 3-foot sea-level rise were all it took to send water and debris over much of the roadway, prompting officials to close one lane for several hours.

Don’t expect that section of highway, spanning Mile Marker 74 to 75 on Lower Matecumbe Key, to be fortified anytime soon.

“Folks would like to see that area high and dry in any storm event, but I think there are other engineering concerns that make this the best we can do at this time,” said John Palenchar, a Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) environmental permits coordinator.

The waves on Sept. 9 overtopped the beach, including a newly constructed dune line, leaving seaweed, lobster traps, logs and other debris on the roadway. High tide that evening also reached the shoulder of the roadway, forcing more cleanup the next morning.

The flooding was only the most recent in a series of storm-related events that have earned the Sea Oats Beach vicinity the reputation as the weakest link on the Overseas Highway.

“Bar none, it is,” said Islamorada Fire Chief William Wagner III, who also heads the village’s emergency operations. “It is tested up to a moderate tropical force [wind], but above that, we are always going to have an inundation as long as we have winds coming from the south.”

In 1998, the roadway was drowned by Hurricane Georges, a Category 2 storm that made landfall in Key West. It was inundated again — twice — in 2005, the first time by Hurricane Dennis, then by Hurricane Rita, both of which brought only tropical-storm conditions to the Islamorada area.

Rita’s inundation came in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when the national media was on a hyper-hurricane alert.

As debris and water closed the roadway — cutting off Key West and Marathon from the mainland for several hours — then-Islamorada Mayor Bob Johnson took to the scene, pleading before rolling CNN cameras for state funding to raise the road.

In the months that followed, FDOT officials talked about committing the resources for such a project. But anticipated costs and concerns that elevating the road would redirect water to low-lying homes on the bay side of the highway eventually led the agency to abandon the idea. Sea Oats Beach is also a turtle nesting site, making permitting more complicated.

FDOT instead opted for a less sweeping fix, spending $6 million last year on an erosion-control project that involved laying a series of interconnected concrete blocks below the beach that were designed to hold the sand in place. The project also included shoulder-widening as well as construction of a dune line a few feet high.

The agency’s goal was to protect the roadway from being undermined by a major storm. Keeping water off the top of the road surface was not the focus.

In the aftermath of Ike, Palenchar said there are no indications that FDOT has had a change of heart.

“My sense is that, given all the constraints at this location, this is the best strategy,” he said.

Wagner said more needs to be done.

“We have been dealing with the DOT since 2004 to let them know this is an enormous vulnerability to the county,” he said.

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