Johnny Come Lately's?

We made it to St. Augustine and stayed at Stage Coach RV Park. Paved roads to gravel sites and a large concrete patio. It's a small, family run (3rd generation), campground. There is no pool, but they have a lot of other activities and I suppose people do that. We didn't. While we walked the park for exercise, we spent most of our time exploring the St. Augustine and the historic district. I've mentioned more than once that the housing boom is on in Florida and St Augustine is no different.

Directly across the street there is a massive condo complex being built. Stagecoach is conveniently located a couple of miles from Interstate 95. The exit for State Route 16, which is under construction right at the end of County road 208. And it's a mess and almost always thick with traffic.

Stagecoach is a quiet park, but one of the nicest features is access to the trolley tours of historic St. Augustine. If you buy a pass, a shuttle bus will pick you up at the campground and bring you back when you're done. Of course it's within specific hours, but a full day seems enough for some folks, but not us. Frankly, you'd need a couple of days of the trolleys because they are hop on, hop off affairs, leaving you to wander specific areas that appeals to your interests. We seemed to be attracted to the distilleries and wineries. Throw in a historic site or two and the days seem to fly. Besides, we like to walk and who knows what you'll see during the hike!

After we got settled, the Eatons came to spend the next day with us. It was a fun day, as their daughters, Parker & Blakely enjoyed most everything the park had to offer, while Sean, Nikki, Julie and I caught up with one another. Wine might have been involved, which Sean has developed a good appreciation for. These are among our favorite people and if I were ever to write a self-help book about the joys, trials and challenges of raising a young family, I would use Sean and Nikki as the role models. Although they're not completely without issues. I mean Yankee fans? What the...

There's more to Florida than Disney

People come from all over to visit Disney. It's been a family destination ever since Anaheim was constructed and Disney World came into vogue in fall of 1971. It's very expensive and seems tough to get on rides without their "Fastpass". You'd be right if you guessed I don't care for it. Actually, the St. Augustine area is ripe with historic sites, attractions, beach life, wineries, distilleries and a lot of very good food. If you like to shop, there's premium outlets, or artsy stores on St. George Street. No offense Mickey, but mice really don't rock my world.

So we bought the trolley tour tickets and as promised a van came to the campground and whisked us away, dropping us off at the center of what once was close to the center of St. Augustine. We visited the old jail, which was described by our guide as horrible. The sheriff was an imposing man who towered above everyone and he was described also as horrible. The inmate below is talking about the conditions of the cells. Again, horrible. Horrible is how it was. Horrible then is nothing that we deem horrible today.

We can deliver it in two weeks!?

We then took a tour of the first general store in St. Augustine, which was owned by C.F. Hamblen, who was a real salesman. If snake oil comes to mind, that is an apt description of the salesman who worked there. He featured everything that was new in the day and we encourage anyone who visits to see this store. It's is cleverly arranged and presented, where the tour guides are garbed and speak in period. There you'll find the very latest of technological marvels to make life easier. You'll also find clothing and all kinds of supplies. There's over 100,000 items to choose from. Everything can easily be delivered. After spending a couple of hours at the Jail and General Store, we hopped onto the trolley and headed to other points of interest. Julie notes that women liked to wear hats adorned with faux birds. Of course, you could add a dead bird to a hat, which was very possible. They sold them, if you wanted them. Nope, no dead bird hats for Julie... thankfully!

On St. George Street, we stopped at Gate City Spirits that makes flavored whiskeys. They provide free samples of what they sell (not enough to give you a serious buzz), but it's pleasant enough experience. We ate lunch at a café that had a balcony overlooking the St. George St., which was nice - they had live music and the artist was funny and played a wide array of ballads to foot stomping sing-alongs. I don't know if it was whiskey sampling, but Julie belted out some tunes!

We hopped back on the trolley and headed down towards San Sebastian winery. Along the way, we saw Flagler College that claims host to a lot of activities, aside from the endless street festivals. Flagler had a lot to do with Florida's growth; he was pretty wealthy, controlled a lot of St. Augustine in the day and was beyond shrewd and cunning.

Is it made with Muscadine grapes?

At San Sebastian, they had a tour of the facility, explained its history and afterwards we sampled a lot of different wines. We thought they were okay, but then again our rusted out palates couldn't discern between a bottle of ripple and Puligny-Montrachet. Okay, we didn't like them. We left the tour sampling and went upstairs and tried their Ports, which were not bad.

Although the day was long, we decided to have dinner at Harry's, which is pretty good even though it's a chain. They put a Cajun spin on their offerings and it's worth stopping for if you're there for more than a couple of days. We should note that we were seated on a balcony (is that a thing?), that provided a view of the harbor. Harry's isn't the only place in that area for dinner. The Tiny Martini bar is a cool place to stop and have a cocktail before dinner. Yeah, we're tourists so we did it.

Young at heart!

.The next day we ventured downtown to the Fountain of Youth. Okay, there's a big pause here. Juan Ponce De Leon. Born into Spanish nobility, a soldier and explorer, he winds up in the Dominican Republic, although it was not known by that name (Hispaniola), where he served as a governor. He had an idea about a fountain of youth and the Spanish crown granted permission for him to explore what we know today as Puerto Rico. He found his way to St. Augustine and his Fountain of youth. There's a lot more history about JPdL, but I'm not a history teacher and not going into that profession. So..... Julie and I go there with the intent to shave off some years, although we don't know if they assign the reduction years or we can choose some plan from a menu.

Julie took this photo that shows a beautiful Peacock. We don't know if this is what happens if you drink from the Fountain. For all we know it might be Mr. Johannsen from Minnesota. Still, while we were fearful, we pressed on, determined to recapture some of our youth. Any years reduction would be welcomed.

Julie sampled the water, as there's actually a spring that flows with untreated water... supposedly the same as JPdL found. It is chock full of minerals and it honestly doesn't taste bad. We're not skipping around, so I guess the results take a bit longer. I'm your standard consumer and was disappointed that there weren't any user guides.

Truthfully, this area is a large venue that comes with lecture halls, a planetarium, burial grounds, recreations of an established mission, gardens complete with what was grown and what it was used for and a small army of beautifully annoying Peacocks who had no trouble warding me off of their territory even though I was on a walkway.

We wandered until we came upon a group of elderly men (they obviously didn't drink from the fountain), who were completing the reconstruction of a long boat. Their workmanship was exacting, trying to recreate an exact replica of the boats the Spaniards used to ferry heavier items from ships moored in the harbor to dry land. It had taken them months and were nearly finished. One man started chatting with us. I asked questions about the boat and he asked where we were from. I said New England to which he asks, "Who discovered America"? Stop, I need a history book to look it up. Was it the Vikings? But Julie who was listening intently answers in a questioned voice, Columbus? WRONG!! The man loudly accuses us of being Johnny Come Lately's and exclaimed it Juan Ponce de Leon. And if we weren't scared enough of this Octogenarian, he went on to tell us that St. Augustine is this nation oldest continuously run city or something like that... don't know. I liked the Peacock more than this guy I thought was going to harm us. There are no pictures of the boat or him. I'm not reliving the trauma.

Little Shops of Oddities and some more Horrible

After drinking a cup of youth juice, we headed south and wandered in and out of little shops. We encourage people to do this as there are a lot of interesting places lining San Marcos Avenue.

We walked toward Castillo de San Marcos, which is another horrible story. It's worth the time to visit, as a lot of horrible things can be learned there. A lot of history that deserves an extended retelling.

One night we decided to go to the beach. It was different in that it the sand was a coral color and coarser than what we experience in Naples. It made sense as we were on the Atlantic side of Florida.

We found a small restaurant after walking the beach. Dinner was at La Cocina International. The menu/food was average, none of it fried food and the price was reasonable. Service was slow and their wine list was out of stock for what we ordered.

Of all the places we stayed at in Florida, it's hard to choose one place we liked more than another. Sure, Naples was where we spent the majority of this past winter, but Julie and I made a mistake in doing that. We should have stayed for a few weeks, then moved to another part of the state. Although, the Ocala and St. Augustine stops might have been too brief. I suppose it's because we knew what to expect in each area we stayed at by reading on line reviews, yet until you actually get there, you find more than you expected. Even Mousetown was fine. I just have an aversion to mice in pants.