Touring St. Augustine

 We decided to ride the Hop on Hop off tour tram today so we could get an overview of the city.  First we rode the entire loop and heard the history of the city from very knowledgeable tram drivers.  They told us so much it made my head spin.  Basically, the first European to set foot on Florida was Juan Ponce de Leon.  He was looking for the fountain of youth and claimed he discovered it in Florida.  He returned to Spain and then a man named Menendez returned to Florida with the goal of claiming Florida for Spain.  He became the first governor of Florida.  Spain ruled Florida for 200 years before the Britain threw the Spanish out and Florida then became British land.  Most of the buildings we saw today were constructed in the late 1880's when Henry Flagler first came to St. Augustine and liked it so much that he began constructing hotels and even a railroad to bring tourists to the city.  He wanted it to become a tourist destination.  He accomplished that.  At the time he was the owner of Standard Oil and was the second richest man in the United States.

The Fountain of Youth is in this garden which costs $20 a piece to enter so I just took a picture of the garden entrance!

This is a Baptist Church built in the 1880's.  The unusual thing about this church is that the bell tower does not contain a bell.  Mr. Flagler built the church for the congregation with the request that there be no bell...bells make too much noise!

This round extension of the building contains Tiffany stained glass windows that are insured for over 150 million dollars.

Built as a hotel by Flagler but today it houses Flagler College.

Statue of Mr. Flagler in front of Flagler College.

 

Flagler Memorial Presbyterian Church.

Aviles Street - oldest street in city.

Original gates built by the British.

Oldest wooden schoolhouse.

Oldest house in the city.

This building contains a wax museum today and has never been painted.

St. George Street in the heart of the historic district of the city.

Some of the streets have the original brick roadway.

This is where we ate lunch.  It serves Cuban food.

My meal:  Boneless chicken, onions, green peppers, fresh garlic, mushrooms, diced potatoes, chorizo, splashed with a hearty red wine and served with yellow rice...delicious!

Carol's meal:  slices of pork roast, boliche, empanada de picadillo, plantanos, black beans, yuca, and yellow rice - also delicious.  He finished his meal with a cup of Cuban coffee.

Live oak trees dripping with Spanish moss line both sides of this street.

This mustang is made entirely from vintage 1950s and 60s chrome car bumpers.  It was created to celebrate the Denver Broncos' 1987 Super Bowl appearance.

This live oak is called "The Senator" and is 600 years old.  

Built by the Spanish to defend Florida.

This car was on display at the Welcome Center for the Hop on Hop off tours.  Carol liked it so he took this picture.

It was a very nice day.  There was some rain while we were eating lunch but otherwise no rain.  The temps were comfortable.  We enjoyed riding the tram and hearing the history of St. Augustine.  Even though we heard the complete story two times, these old heads cannot remember much of it except it was interesting!  There is so much to see and investigate and we barely scratched the surface.  We could visit here again.
Thankfully, I did figure out part of my problem with the I-cloud pictures.  I needed the pictures to be in Jpeg form and they were not.  I discovered that I could go into settings on my phone and change the format of my pictures.  Problem solved; however, I still have over 100 pictures in the other format that I need to figure out how to get them into Jpeg form.  That is a problem for another day.

Tomorrow we are going to drive part of US Route 1 (the one that started in Key West) along the coast.  It should be a relaxing day.

Goodbye Everglades National Park

Left this was a this morning at 8:00 a.m.  We drove for the last time the beautiful drive of 40 miles from the park to civilization.  There was a lot of traffic on the interstate and it rained off and on.  It was a totally different day from the last four.  I have no beautiful scenery to post but I did see something that I thought was interesting so here we go.

Why would a sign showing a 40 MPH curve be interesting?  Because the sign before this one was a 35 MPH speed limit sign.  You would have to increase your speed to 40 to make this curve.  Most of the time, the speed limit for a curve is less than the regular limit.

I just loved this colorful rooster mailbox.

 

These "no parking" signs lined the exit to a rest area.  I hope the truckers got the message that they are not allowed to park on the side of the road coming out of the rest area.

 

I like this guy.  I think he would be a fun guy with which to camp!

We arrived at Stagecoach RV Park around 4:30.  It is a very nice campground.  The spaces are level and well apart from the next space.  The bathrooms and laundry have been recently renovated and are very nice.  We will be staying here for three nights and two days  Tomorrow we will ride the Hop on Hop off  trolley around St. Augustine.  We have been in St. Augustine and enjoyed the city so we are looking forward to.

I have been working on these blogs since 7:00 p.m. and it is now 11:30 p.m.  I am unhappy that I can't post some pictures.  For the rest of the trip I will make sure to use my camera for more pictures and keep working on correcting the problem I am having.  Time for bed.

Shark Valley Tram

Today we headed north to the Shark Valley part of the Everglades. and it was so much better than going into Miami!  We got to the park bout 10:00 and the tram ride began at 11:00 so we took a short hike.  There are no long hikes in the  Everglades.  That suits us just fine.  Most of the trails are less than a mile long.  All of the trails we took in the park were on  boardwalk for easy hiking.  At the end of this trail we saw our first alligator in the wild.  Of course, I only had the phone with me so I can't post a picture at this time.  Maybe later.

The driver and naturalist who helped explain the things we saw.

  They were very good spotters and were able to show us lots of alligators and birds.  She told us that Everglades National Park is the third largest park in the continental United States after Death Valley and Yellowstone.  She said it was the first park to be established not because of its geology but because of its bio-diversity.  She said that if you were in an airplane flying over the Everglades, you would see mostly water but from the ground, the terrain looks like grasses and trees.  The park is actually mostly water and the water is so important to the plants and animals that live here but the people who live near the park.  She also said that the few trails in the park are short and the best way to see the park was with a canoe or kayak.  There are over 300 different kids of birds in the park.  She told us that the Burmese Boa has destroyed nearly 95% of the small animal population like rabbits, possums, raccoons, white-tailed deer, etc., and now they were eating the small alligators.  It is a problem that so far has not be solved.

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This is a Blue Herrin with a large fish in his mouth and near him is an alligator.

One of several alligators we saw.

Here is a good picture of the heron with the fish in its mouth.  The naturalist said that they fish was too big for the heron's mouth and the bird was probably trying to figure out how to eat the fish.

 

Blue Heron

Alligator

Alligator

Above and below are a couple of hatchling alligators.  You have to look closely.  They have stripes across their backs.

Tri-colored Heron

Observation tower like the one at Clingman's Dome in Smokey Mountain National Park.

 

An Anhinga sunning and drying off his wings.  These birds do not have a natural oil on their feathers so when they dive into the water for a fish, they have to dry off their feather before diving again

Monday evening we had a beautiful sunset but Tuesday and Wednesday evening. It was rainy and overcast so I didn't get any  sunset pictures.  Tonight I was determined to get something and below is what I got.  The clouds tried to hid the sun as it set and so the sunset was not as beautiful as I would have liked.

After we got back from Shark Valley we loaded up the car and packed up what we could so we could get on the road.  We have 360 miles to drive to St. Augustine.

I guess this would be a good time to wrap up my thoughts on Everglades National Park.  I was a bit apprehensive of the park before we got here.  I still remembered the last time that we were here that the mosquitoes were so intense and left bad memories.  I also knew that we would not have water to the camper and would only have cold showers in our campground.  I am so glad that we came to explore more fully this park.  The campground was beautiful and the mosquitoes were controllable with repellent.  After the first night of cold showers, we drove to the other loop where there are hot showers provided by solar panels.  The hot showers were glorious!  There was no cell service and I did miss doing the blog but the quiet was a peaceful, relaxing thing that was good for the soul.  It actually reminded us the "good old days" when we tented with the kids...no internet or cell phones, go to bed when it gets dark, quiet, dark nights, playing UNO with the kids, etc.  It has been a good four days.