St. Augustine, Florida

My first experience with St. Augustine could have killed me.
 
We were driving across the bridge over the Matanzas river when suddenly I saw a traffic light—which I thought was a ridiculous place to have it. I almost didn't stop. There wasn't even an intersection. Then it dawned on me. This could be a drawbridge!
 
We don't have drawbridges where I come from. I've never seen one in person, and frankly, I wasn't even sure they really existed. But within seconds, the road before us began to rise until it came to a ninety-degree angle. Within just a couple minutes a gap had been created in the bridge and soon a sail boat with a tall mast came gliding through the aperture. Boy, was I glad we had stopped!
 

Drawbridge at the Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine.

Little did I know that the river we had just crossed played a crucial role in the founding of St. Augustine. In the year 1564 the land that is now the United States was wild and unexplored by Europeans. This was also a period engulfed in the passions and conflicts of the Protestant Reformation. Would these new conquered lands become Catholic or Protestant nations?
 
In this year Fort Caroline, in the northern extremes of Florida along the Atlantic Coast, was established by Huguenots (French Protestants). This resulted in the ire of the Spanish who had already claimed the land. Fort Caroline also provided a strategic base where it could attack Spanish treasure fleets sailing along the coast back to Europe.
 

View of the Matanzas River from Fort Matanzas.

To counter this move, King Phillip II sent Admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés with over 800 people to remove the French. After a brief skirmish between the two armies, the Spanish retired to the newly founded post of St. Augustine, some 35 miles south of Fort Caroline. On September 10, 1565 Jean Ribault, the leader of the French, sailed to attack St. Augustine. Unfortunately for them, they encountered a hurricane that sent them further south and wrecked their boat. Menéndez took full advantage of the largely unoccupied settlement and easily captured Fort Caroline.
 
Upon his return to St. Augustine he learned from the Timucuan Indians of a group of white men on a beach a few miles to the south. He marched with 50 soldiers and found about 130 shipwrecked Frenchmen trying to make their way back to Fort Caroline, but who had been blocked in their journey by an inlet of the Matanzas River. They were hungry and worn, and Menéndez informed them that he had already captured the fort. He urged the men to surrender, with no promise of clemency. They did surrender, and upon bringing them across the river he slaughtered all of them but sixteen. Two weeks later a similar scene unfolded. In all nearly 250 were killed. Hence the name of the Matanzas River, which comes from the Spanish word for “slaughters.”
 

Streets of St. Augustine, Florida.

We continued onto Anastasia Island where we checked into our Airbnb and then connected with our friends, Wendy and Dirk, who live in St. Augustine. Originally we hadn't planned on coming this far north into Florida, but we were made a deal that if we spent a couple nights in St. Augustine, then Dirk and Wendy's grandson, Gavin, would come all the way from North Carolina to meet us . . . AND they would teach us to surf! Not a bad proposition. Of course, Gavin's mother, Vanessa, would have to drive him, and I believe the journey would be eight hours each way, so we appreciated their sacrifice. Gavin had been close friends with my daughter, Savanah, so they were anxious to meet up.
 
After meeting with them we all headed toward town. On the way there we stopped at a lighthouse, crossed another drawbridge at the Bridge of Lions, and rode a carousel for one dollar a person. Now we were parked and ready to explore the Colonial Quarter on foot.
 

Governor's House in the Colonial Quarter of St. Augustine.

St. Augustine is the longest continually inhabited city of European origin in the continuous forty-eight states. It is now 455 years old. Walking through the streets does not have the same feel as walking through the ancient Gothic Quarter of Barcelona, for example. No. Walking through the streets of St. Augustine is akin to walking through Disneyland. Everything is commercialized. Nothing looks old. All the buildings have a fresh coat of bright paint. And prices are sky-high.
 
But, having said that, it was pleasant to walk along these pedestrian roadways. We began on Spanish Street and ended on St. George Street. There are clothing stores, restaurants, gelato shops, souvenir stores and the occasional historical landmark. We also saw a street performer and horse-drawn carriage rides.
 
On Spanish Street we came across a beige-colored two-story home built in 1807, known as one of the original Minorcan homes. Minorca is part of the Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean Sea, and in 1767 a Scottish man named Andrew Turnbull led a group of 1,000 Minorcans to Florida as indentured servants to work on his indigo plantation. After a few years of disease and toil, many in the weary group fled their master and sought refuge in St. Augustine. At the time St. Augustine had come under British Rule, but in 1783 with the second Treaty of Paris, the territory was given back to Spain. Ironically, the island of Minorca was also given to Spain as part of that same treaty, as were the Bahama Islands. The Minorcans have since played a key role in the growth and culture of St. Augustine.
 

Triay-Hall House built in 1807 is an original Minorcal home.

We walked along St. George Street as far as the cathedral, but didn't go inside. We ate at a restaurant on the corner of King Street and Avenida Menéndez. A man in the lobby played Love Shack on his guitar as we climbed the stairs to eat upstairs. I deliberated between jambalaya and the lobster and shrimp tacos, but decided on shrimp and grits. On our way back through town I bought a watermelon and hibiscus popsicle.
 

Monument on the grounds of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Augustine.

We also stopped at the Huguenot Cemetery. It's interesting how each historical landmark helps fit together another piece of the puzzle. Following the second Spanish period mentioned above, Florida was ceded to the United States under the Adams-Onís Treaty of 1819, ratified in 1821. Now that the controlling culture had shifted once again from Catholic to Protestant, there was a new need for a Protestant cemetery. The nearby Tolomato Cemetery was barred to all non-Catholic residents.
 
The cemetery operated between 1821 and 1884. Despite the name, there are no known Huguenots buried in the cemetery. The burial ground came just in time for an epidemic of yellow fever.
 
I had about ten minutes to peruse the Huguenot Cemetery and found it very interesting with many old grave markers. Some of the burials were marked with rectangular cuboid stone markers the length of the grave. I found one from 1821 and two from 1823. In total, the graveyard is fairly small. I'm sure many of the burials are not marked.
 

Huguenot Cemetery of St. Augustine, founded in 1821.

Grave of Charles W. Bulow, a plantation owner from St. Augustine. Died in 1823 and buried in the Huguenot Cemetery.

We began our second day in St. Augustine on Butler Beach. Everyone in our family agreed that this was the funnest day of our vacation. As luck would have it we were in Florida for the final launch of the Delta IV Medium rocket. The only problem was that we were 94 miles away from the Kennedy Space Center. We woke up early enough to be on the beach at 8:45. Jordan watched the live stream on his phone and we all looked toward the south. Billowing clouds hung low in the horizon, but beyond that the skies were clear. We had heard you could see the rocket from this distance, but no one in our group had actually done it. The countdown came, the rocket lifted, and within seconds we could see an arching plume in the southern sky. A couple minutes later came a sonic boom.
 

Watching the launch of the Delta IV medium rocket from Butler Beach.

Now, it was time to get surfing. Dirk and Wendy remind me of the stereotypical beach bums—but in a good way! If they could, I think they would spend 365 days of the year at the beach. That's probably why they moved to St. Augustine. Dirk is the type that wears Bermuda shorts and a light Hawaiian shirt, but most often, no shirt at all. I believe they attend a Christian church for surfers.
 

Coming from the desert, no one in our family had ever surfed. Dirk taught us to lay belly-down on the board, paddle when the swell came in, and then at just the right moment stand up and ride the wave. It was much more difficult than it appeared. I don't know how many times I wiped out and got washing machined below the waves. I ended the session with bruised muscles, sand rashes on my skin and salt water up my nose. Jordan and Kaitlyn did relatively well.
 
In the end I used the surf board as a boogie board and just rode the waves while lying on my belly. It was enjoyable and I received far fewer bruises.
 

A few miles south of Butler Beach is Fort Matanzas National Monument. We pulled into the parking lot just in time to catch the ferry to Rattlesnake Island. Unlike the impressive Castle of San Marcos which is within the city limits of St. Augustine, the outpost of Fort Matanzas is a lesser-known fortress from the Spanish occupation.
 
The Spanish had good reason to fear an attack because they suffered many throughout the years including one in 1740 by the Governor of the British colony of Georgia, James Oglethorpe, who besieged the city for thirty-nine days. The major weakness for St. Augustine was the Matanzas inlet because it was out of range for the cannons at San Marcos Castle. For this reason it was decided to build a fort near the inlet of the river.
 
The building began in 1740 with the help of slaves, convicts and additional troops from Cuba. The fort is 50 feet on each side with a 30-foot tower. Although the fort fell into decay after the British acquired St. Augustine, it has since been restored and includes one of the original canons. The only way to get there is via a ferry run by the park service. Visitors are allowed to peruse the soldier's quarters, as well as enjoy the view from the observation deck.
 

Fort Matanzas.

From the observation deck at Fort Matanzas.

On the ferry to Rattlesnake Island.

Our trip to St. Augustine would not have been what it was without the hospitality of our friends. After visiting the fort we spent a couple hours at the house of Dirk and Wendy in Butler Beach. From what I understand they bought the house for a good price after the entire neighborhood had been devastated by a hurricane. They fixed it up and decorated it with surf boards and other memorabilia to always remind one that they are next to the ocean.
 
In their back yard is a canal that winds through the neighborhood and eventually connects with the Matanzas River. They have a boat that they sometimes use, but on this day we paddled a canoe. We lowered the vessel into the water and took turns stroking oars to explore the waterway through the area. [As an interesting side-note, Dirk and Wendy have recently posted pictures on Facebook of dolphins swimming through their canal, right in their backyard!]
 

Dirk and Wendy's backyard!

As dusk approached, we felt an itch to return to the beach one last time. We first stopped at the Sunset Grille to eat dinner, then we drove to a another beach. We didn't have a lot of time, but I could have stayed there for hours. The sky was now filled with pink and orange hues and the sun was about to disappear over the trees. The waves rolled in rhythmical motion, leaving a white foam as it returned to the sea.
 
The beach where we walked had a short, but photogenic pier. We walked beneath the deck boards and let the warm water run up and over our sandals while we admired the evening and took a few pictures.
 

St. Johns County Ocean Pier.

Like I stated, our time at the beach was far too short. We returned to the home of our friends and said our goodbyes. Living across the country we didn't know when we'd see them again. For Savanah and Gavin it was particularly hard and they shed many tears.
 
But there was one more item of business before we left. There is one item that uniquely belongs to St. Augustine. In fact, you could easily say that St. Augustine is the “capital of the world” in regard to this item. No one is exactly sure of it's origins, but some speculate it was brought by indentured servants from Minorca. Wendy had a plant in her home where she was lovingly growing this item. Then she graciously picked and gave me . . . a datil pepper. ♠