We left Daytona Beach heading for St. Augustine, continuing along the AICW (Atlantic Inter-Coastal Waterway). Wow, that word 'Atlantic' has a whole new meaning. Back on the 'Atlantic' in the home stretch of our big loop adventure. This particular day of traveling was sunny and calm but we were remained that it not always the case, as we past another sunken boat. It was so near the channel, it had its own warning buoy, so sad. But on the other hand we passed under our first painted bridge. The pilings had paintings of manatees, dolphins and other creatures of the sea. Interesting that someone thought of all the water traffic under the bridge.
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| Daytona Beach - Sunken sailboat |
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| Daytona Beach - Seabreeze Bridge. See paintings at base of the columns. |
We soon knew we were getting close when we passed the St. Augustine lighthouse. This is as close we were going to get as we were docking in old town, St. Augustine, and without a car, it would have been a long walk. As it turned out, we spent the next 2 days walking miles to explore everything that the old town area had to offer. I'm sure our feet couldn't have walked any more than we did.
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| St. Augustine Lighthouse |
As soon as we got docked up and secure, we headed into town and we were immediately met with a battle reenactment of Searle's Sack. This was the famous bloody pirate raid that took place in 1668, between the freebooters (privateers) lead by Captain Robert Searle and the city's Spanish defenders. They were there to loot the silver ingots held the royal Spanish coffers. We had no idea this was an annual event but were lucky enough to be there and it was awesome to witness.
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| Gathering of the pirates before the raid. |
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| Heading into the fray |
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| Spanish fighting back |
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This rifle was fascinating, it was more like a small canon. It was so heavy it needed a sturdy wooden support under it. It took two men to get a shot off but once it fired there was no ignoring the power that would have been behind it.
I caught it just as it fired.
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With that fun experience and a quick trip around town, we headed back to the boat with a million things we wanted to see over the next couple days. We were greeted at our slip by this great white egret. He really didn't seem to mind us and we able to get this great pic of him.
Bright and early the next day we stopped for a hardy brunch before heading to Castillo de San Marcos, fort built by the Spanish. It was actually ordered built as a result of the 1668 Searle's Raid but wasn't completed until 1695. It is the oldest masonry fort in the continental United States. The fort changed hands many times over the centuries between Spain, Britain and America, including between confederate and union forces during the Civil War. As you see in the pics below, I was fascinated with the canons.
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| Castillo de San Marcos - Small scale model of the fort and me at the draw bridge entrance. |
Below is one of my favorite cannons in the fort. First pic on left - It was made in Spain and transported to the fort. It is a weapon of war but is also a work of art. Made of bronze, each cannon has the name of the maker, what city if was made in and date of manufacture. Second pic on right - They also have the royal coat of arms of the Spanish King and Queen who reigned at the time it was manufactured. Third pick below - Each cannon has raised handles called dolphins which are actually shaped like dolphins. Each cannon also has it's own name. In the case of my favorite cannon below, it is an 18-pounder bronze made in Seville 1764. Named El Milanes (The one from Milan).
View of Matanzas Bay from the batteries.
The fort is actually constructed from coquina meaning 'tiny shell' in Spanish. It is a rare limestone found in the local barrier islands. 150 million pounds was quarried, barged across the bay to be cut, shaped and laid in the fort. Below are pics of the stone worn down by time, exposing the tiny seashells embedded in the limestone.
In our roaming around old town, we visited the oldest wooden school house, which in its self was interesting but not as interesting as the social norms of the times. The 1872 rules for teachers ran from simple things like preparing each day for classes where they had to bring in a bucket of water, a scuttle of coal (what's a scuttle?), clean the chimney, to whittling the pen nibs (nibs?) to the individual tastes of the students. But the rules also include social expectations from the men could take an evening off every week for courting purposes or two if they attend church to the women who married or conducted themselves in unseemly behavior would be dismissed. Try that double standard today! There are others concerning the encouragement of savings for retirement and having to defend your worth if you smoke, consume liquor, frequent pool halls or get shaved in a barber shop. ;)
On our way back to the Independence at the end of day one we came upon the St. Augustine bridge of Lions which is a beautiful double-leaf bascule bridge that crossed over to Anastasia Island. There are a pair of marble Medici lions that guard the bridge.
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| St. Augustine - Bridge of Lions |
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| Ken and one of the Medici lions. Independence in the background (bottom left). |
The next day we headed off to see Flagler College and other historical sites but the day was really focused on things to please the pallet. We started with St. Augustine Distillery where we sampled handcraft small-batch spirits of port finished bourbon, double cask bourbon, vodka made from sugar cane, rum and gin. All made from fresh Florida corps. We toured the distillery and sampled everything they had to offer and some of them twice. Nice buzz going as we then moseyed over to Whetstone Chocolate factory for another tour and samples. Our final stop was San Sebastian Winery where Ken not being the wine lover like me, abstained from the wine sampling. He sobered up and I got a wine buzz on top of my sugar high. We left each establishment with gifts and goodies. Great afternoon. We topped our last day off with dinner at a great Cuban restaurant, The Colombia.
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| Everything hand bottled, corked and labeled at St. Augustine Distillery. |
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| Not the greatest fashion statement but a must for the chocolate factory tour. |
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| I skipped the tour and went straight to the wine tasting. Yum! |
With the end of our visit to St. Augustine we headed for Jacksonville to begin a side trip down the St. John's river. Another great adventure but more for nature thrills vs. pallet thrills that we experience in St. Augustine. Look for our next blog on this next leg of the great loop adventure, coming soon.
PS from Roofus:
The first thing you will notice is there is no cute, adorable picture of me in my PS from Roofus. My humans may have had enjoyed this last stop but all I got to see was the inside of the boat for hours on end, BY MYSELF. And then they had the nerve to go out again at night for dinner the last night here and then to add insult to injury, no doggie bag came home to me. So I decided to post a pic from the oldest school house where there is a boy in-time out under the stairs of the school house which is the called the 'Dudgeon'. The Dudgeon is where my humans need to be for a while as this is where unruly students were placed for punishment, complete with a sign that says "Please do not touch student: He bites!" if my humans were in the dudgeon, it should also say "Do not feed" whether you have a doggie bay or not. That will teach them to not ignore me and remember to bring me treats when they do go out and food is involved.....
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