St. Augustine, FL

St. Augustine is a beautiful place filled with some of the earliest history of our country, Christopher Columbus set sail for the new world in 1492, under his employ on that voyage was a man named
Juan Ponce De Leon, he returned years later on his own voyage in 1513 and landed in St. Augustine, he was looking for gold and a rumored fountain of youth, he named the land La Florida. in 1565 a man named Pedro Menendez De Aviles came to found the land for the crown and secure their hold on it, he was the first Governor and named the area San Augustin, the area has gone through centuries of change and different forms of change. it has had numerous well known pirates such as Francis Drake, Robert Searle and even Blackbeard. it is the birthplace of Catholicism for this nation, being brought by the Spanish in 1513, it has been the birthplace of invention, with a Mr. Henry M. Flagler who not built the town into a booming city of wealth and prestige but but employed new comers such as Mr. Louis Comfort Tiffany, who's stained glass would become world renowned, as well as a Mr. Thomas Edison, who had one of his first power stations at one of Mr. Flaglers properties, it is one of the two main sites where Dr. Martin Luther King led his freedom rally's but also where he spoke and stayed, the same house that Dr. king stayed at later housed Jacky Robinson and his wife, he also preached a sermon at the same church as Dr. King, the whoolworths store here is where civil rights activist's sat at the soda counter stools and demanded to be served. St. Augustine has one of the oldest streets in the us, and is home to the very First Ripley's Believe it or Not museum.

Some of the first settlers to come to Florida to make their new homes, so if you ever wondered where the original "Cracker" came from, here ya go.  They where named this because of their main diet, they were farmers looking to get a better life.






The other settlers at the time where called Tin Can Tourists,  which were basically some of the first RV'ers who heard of the glamorous town and wanted to see it, several of which whom stayed.

Original City gates from the Spanish era,
also the Fort Castillo De San Marcos which was never defeated in battle, they are made of a building substance called cocina that when the fort walls were blasted in the day, they would go out at night and patch the holes so that in the morning it would appear that no damage had been done at all, 

 Beds where the soldiers would have slept, looks like a tight squeeze.

View from the top was beautiful, it was also the breeziest place in the fort, this would have been where I would have wanted to be perched for the simple reason that it wasn't as hot.

  Two Henry Flagler Churches, one was built as a memorial to his daughter and grandchild who perished on the way to come live with him.





All of the Terracotta work was done by hand.

 The Lightner Mueseum, Mr. lightner believed that everyone needed to have a hobby, his hobby was collecting everyone elses hobbies,
this building was originally Mr. Flaglers alcazar hotel, he purchased it and turned it into his museum.

 Dennis walking through the courtyard at the Lightner Museum.
 A hand carved grandfather clock and some of the original Tiffany glass windows.
Mr. Lightner had good taste, there are pieces from all around the world and many centuries.

 Aviles Street is one of the oldest streets in the us. it still holds a myriad of local restaurants and shops.

This street has Live oaks with spanish moss growing on them curving towards each other in both directions, it has been called the most beautiful street in the us.

 The Spanish Military Hospital, which were not only way ahead of their time in care but had some of the best healthcare available, their morbidity rate was around 75% in a time when most hospitals were 25%, only soldiers could be cared for here so I imagine the enlistment sheet was full.

 Amazingly their are a lot of instruments from this era that haven't changed much, I guess if its not broke.....

 Saw this at the Pirate & Treasure Museum,
this was a huge piece of my childhood so I was very excited.








Goonies Never Say Die!

 This was the site of what Ponce De Leon thought was the fountain of youth, the average person at this time only lived to 35 or 40 years old, when Juan came here he noticed that all the Timucua Indians were living to be 80 or more, they all drank from this natural spring so he assumed that this had to be the reason why.

 Some of the residents of the Fountain of youth Park.
this is a mother with her new chicks underneath following along.

 they even had this beautiful albino.

 The Florida School for the Deaf and Blind, it was one of the first deaf and blind schools ever and had a student by the name of Ray Charles that attended until he was 14 years old.

 St. Augustine Distillery, only a year old and already winning awards for their Vodka & Gin.
it is in the old Ice Plant building from the late 1800's

















This is the Original Ripleys Museum.

 This ferris wheel went all the way to the 2nd story, it was massive, I couldn't get all of it into the picture.

This is a portrait that was made out of tiny legos.

Not sure who this crazy person is but I'm sure their fabulous!




Statue of David, a replica of the original, even made with the same Carrera Marble, they cover his with these tall bushes to keep car wrecks down.

 This is the St. Augustine Lighthouse & Museum
it has 219 stairs to climb to the top as well as going back down, best workout ever!

 this was the lighthouse keepers housing, the other side of that red building was the Lighthouse keepers assistant's housing, and the upper attic space was the 2nd keepers place, can you say cramped.

 This is the globe and Lens that allow the light to be seen from a far distance.

 the views from the top.

I can say that our stay here has been adventurous, I have learned more than I remember, and will remember more than I learned. Definitely a place we will come back to.  

Savannah, GA

We have arrived in Savannah to the view of tons of poplar trees covered in Spanish moss,

when we got here we were told that there was a river just down the road where could take a nice stroll or fish, when we went to see it we were greeted with a muddy valley for miles, they have had so little rain here that it has dried up the river inlets.

Well if there's anything that I can say about Savannah it's that it is full of history, established in 1733 by General James Edward Oglethorpe, it was a British colony until the war for independence was won. since then it has been a leader in first's, Juliette Gorden Low Founder of the girl scouts of America lived here,

    the Telfair Academy of Arts and Sciences is here which was one of the first museums in the south, Savannah has one of the first African baptist churches, the third oldest Jewish synagogue in America, and the lady and sons restaurant owned by Paula Deen the first to use a cup of butter in every single dish they serve.
Savannah has been through many battles, had many great military visitor's and still boasts some of the oldest original squares, some of which are over 300 years old.
We went to see some of these and Forsyth Park was one of them, full of trees and picnicking families,

  some of the other squares included the Palaski Monument and across from one of the squares was the Christ Church, famous for being the place that President George Washington attended mass when he visited Savannah,

 The Spanish moss was everywhere we went except for to of the squares to which they had some very interesting stories involving a General Oglethrope, who apparently hated the stuff so much that he use to rip it down off of every tree that he came across, and the tell is that he is still doing it in those squares today, haha or it could be that the trees have grown so much that it blocks out all of the air flow, which they need to live, but whatever.

even though we were walking in 94' degree weather with extreme humidity we still really enjoyed our walk,

the Federal Hall building was on our walk to the river bay, it had beautiful 24K gold leaf on the dome that I was told was not original and was added in 1984, before that is was just copper.

On our way back to our car we noticed that there was a large amount of police across from where we were parked, some holding sniper rifles and shields, firefighters also arrived a short time later.
15 minutes later they all came out of a building with a cuffed man with a policeman holding tayzer cables, I'm not sure what the man did but he must have been really naughty.






 later in the week I went on a tasting tour where I got to get a little of savannah's culture through their fare.
the tour was awesome and gave us fun little tidbits about the town and its history.

One of the cute stories was of the terracotta griffin outside of one of the buildings, it is across from a main road and one evening a boozed up driver decided not to turn and ran right into it completely destroying it, they recreated it from photos that tourists had taken and built it this time out of concrete as well as placing a fence around part of it, unfortunately since it was built out of concrete it settled and not sort of leans to one side and the expression on its face looks like it is scared to be facing traffic fence or not.

All in all our trip has been nice though I would definitely not want to live here it was nice to visit.
So now we say goodbye to Savannah and continue our journey, until next time.