A Day in St. Augustine

Today we took the trolley tour of St. Augustine, giving us a chance to get a good look at this, the oldest European settlement in the United States, being founded and settled by the French and then the Spanish in 1565.

Our tour started at the Old St. Johns County Jail (there was free parking there for folks on the tours). We didn't get an opportunity to tour it as they were doing charter tours for schools today.

These are some of the rebuilt redoubts, which were part of the city's defensive wall --

 

The old city gates were rescued from developers by history buffs --

 

Another part of the surviving wall over by the fort --

The town is full of gorgeous old buildings like this Methodist church --

Or the local Catholic church --

Many that were built as hotels are now part of a college --

We got off of the trolley to check out the fort, Castillo de San Marcos --

The fort is run by the National Park Service, so we got to use our Senior pass, a nice $14 savings!

There is one entrance to the fort, across the dry moat and through the sally port --

The walls are made of coquina, a type of local limestone made up of many tiny shells. Because of its conglomerate mixture, the coquina contains millions of microscopic air pockets making it compressible. A cannon ball fired at a more solid material such as granite or brick would shatter the wall into flying shards and rubble. Cannon balls fired at the coquina burrowed their way into the rock and stuck there!

The other feature we noted that was different from other forts we've seen was the presence of bronze cannons. They are green instead of black...

 

This is another wall still standing built by the Spanish called wattle and dab. It's actually man-made of seashells and mortar --

We found a wonderful restaurant out on St. Augustine Beach. It's in an old fish camp out in the marsh near the Inland Waterway. Called the Salt Water Cowboys, it sure served some good shrimp!

This Great Blue Heron was standing in the marsh outside of the restaurant while we ate --

Bok Tower

Our friend Leslie has been talking to us about visiting Bok Tower Gardens ever since we got to Florida. Her family often came here when she was a child. A National Historic Landmark, it is located near Lake Wales. It is about halfway from where we are at Peace River RV Park and Mouse Mountain RV Park where they are parked, so we decided to meet up there this afternoon.

Built between 1927 and 1929, the was built to house the Edward Bok family carillon and serve as a centerpiece for the extensive gardens. It is 205 feet tall and weighs 5500 TONS!

There is a moat that surrounds the Tower, full of huge koi.

When she was a little girl, Leslie says there were swans in the moat that defended the marble border around the water -- they didn't bother you if you stayed on the brick walkway, but if you stepped on the marble, watch out! The docent told us that the swans finally got so aggressive that they had to be removed...

The tower is made of brick with an outer facing of pink and gray Georgia marble and Florida coquina, a limestone of shell and coral fragments.

All of the carving was done on site by Lee Lawrie of New York City.

This is the view looking out from the hill on which Bok Tower is built. The hill that it is built on is the highest elevation in Florida!

Looking back at the Tower from the edge of the hill --

This is the brass door going into the Tower (not open to the public) --

The door, by Samuel Yellin of Philadelphia, depicts the Biblical story of Creation --

The grillwork near the top of the Tower has colorful ceramic tiles --

 
Since it was still the holidays, the carillon played a Christmas song every half hour. The carillon has 60 bronze bells ranging in weight from 16 pounds to eleven plus tons! At 3 PM we enjoyed a half hour concert that ranged from Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring to Let Me Call You Sweetheart and Over There.

After the concert, we spent several hours exploring the gardens (I'll share some of those pictures tomorrow..!) and then went into Lake Wales for dinner at Norby's. Not much to look at, I doubt if we'd have gone into the place if it hadn't been for some great -- and very accurate -- reviews. The appetizer we ordered, Horsey Bites, was so good, we could have made a meal of it. The medium rare pieces of Filet Mignon on toast rounds topped with little mounds of horseradish were delicious!