Before we left Florida, there was one city that I wanted to visit - St. Augustine. I’m a huge history buff, and love to explore old places. Bill - not so much. He humors me and goes for some of it, as long as there’s good food involved somewhere.
St. Augustine, FL was founded by the Spanish in 1565. It rivals Santa Fe, NM as the oldest city in the United States. It was protected by Castillo de San Marcos from the British who settled further up the coast. It has been said that Ponce de Leon landed here in his quest for the fountain of youth. The Cathedral Basilica of St. Augustine is the oldest Catholic Church in the city. So you get the idea. It’s old. Older than the Plymouth colony, founded in 1620; older than Jamestown, founded in 1605. The architecture here is beautiful old Spanish Colonial with intricate cast iron balconies, and they harvested blocks of calcified crushed seashells, called “coquina”, to make sturdy concrete-like structures.
I debated as to whether I should take the hop-on, hop-off trolley to get a good overview of the area. I could have gotten a discount ticket by booking online, and they would pick up and drop off directly from our RV park. But even with stringent cleaning after each route, plexiglass between rows, and the fact that it was open-air, many of the sites that I wanted to visit were closed and I wasn’t really keen on sitting that close to other people. So Bill drove me downtown, found a shady spot to park on the square, and I struck out on foot. It was near 90 degrees with high humidity, so I tried to pick and choose carefully.
The old historic downtown is very walkable, especially the pedestrian-only St. George Street. Castillo de San Marcos (a National Park) and the Colonial Quarter were closed. I started by respectfully walking through the Cathedral, viewing the frescoes and gilded icons. (It’s also nice because it’s cool inside.).
Then I walked quickly down St. George Street, looking for authentic St. Augustine amongst the touristy offerings (although the chocolate shop was SO tempting. They pipe that glorious smell onto the street). I stopped at the oldest wooden schoolhouse, and walked all the way down to the city gates.
Then I took a left and meandered through the narrow streets back toward Flagler College. It was originally built as a luxury hotel by the railroad magnate Henry Flagler. It was decorated with Tiffany stained glass windows and chandeliers and I hear the girls dorms are beautiful. Of course they were not giving public tours, so I admired it from the outside. By the time I got back to the car, my face was bright red and my water bottle was empty. Time for an Icee!
We drove out to the beach and found a free parking spot at the pier. We walked out to the water and cooled off by dipping our toes in the Atlantic Ocean. It’s amazing to me that beaches are so different from place to place. Here, the water was darker and cooler and the sand was a course pinkish-beige.
The next day, Bill and I parked along the river and walked to Harry’s restaurant. It has a large open patio and we sat with a view of the water. The crabcakes were amazing!
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