St Augustine, January 24-30, 2022
St Augustine is a charming city with a nice compact historic core well-suited to walking around with many conveniently located restaurants at the center. We stayed at the very central marina, but honestly I think the mooring fields would have been just as good and a lot cheaper. One of our new boat friends had also anchored out beyond the mooring field and despite what we had read about it having dubious holding, they had no problems at all, even though it did blow fairly hard. Unfortunately for our enjoyment of the town, we arrived just ahead of a record cold spell. Once the front came through, the winds were gusty and cold. We were disappointed that despite arriving in Florida, we were still going to need to use our space heaters.
As the weather worsened, the seas got choppy and soaked the docks.
Apparently this drove fish into the dock, because the pelicans took up residence.
We also found ourselves tied up just a few feet from the drawbridge. It opened every half hour and the bridge keeper had a loudspeaker to announce that the bridge would soon open or close, that the bridge was actively opening or closing and to admonish pedestrians to "Stay behind the yellow line." By the end of the trip, both Lisa and I could recite the entire phrasebook of the bridge keeper and we often called out in unison with her. We sometimes added "you moron" or "that means you, guy in the spandex pants with the bicycle" to her announcements for our own amusement. At least when the weather was the worst, there were few boats or pedestrians to cause announcements. The marina was very convenient for receiving Amazon deliveries. We had at least 5 packages waiting for us when we arrived and I'm quite sure we sent at least that many more while we were there.
One of the coolest features of the city is the looming Spanish fortress built to overlook the harbor and protect the city from pirates and Englishmen. Properly know as Castillo de San Marcos, it is the oldest stone fortress in the US (which means a baby of 300 odd years old to the mocking Euro tourists). It had interesting displays and exhibits and gorgeous views of the city. It wasn't much trouble because this is Florida and the highest spot in town is like 10 feet above sea level.
One of the best things about St Augustine was the proximity to Lisa's mom, Gail. She drove down to visit with us for a few days when the weather was slightly less bad, although still quite chilly. She joined us on some tourist adventures, like a trolley tour of the city (which ended up being mostly a recitation of the crooked deeds done by Henry Flagler, first among robber barons at developing all of Florida) some distillery touring and a couple of nice restaurants. We ate outdoors at one place where the heat lamps did their best to make things a decent temperature but mostly failed. We had some hot spiced cider and enjoyed each other's company enough to make it bearable, but it was certainly not the Florida we were hoping for. For the 100th time on the trip, we resolved that we would absolutely make the jump south much earlier next year. Gail was also kind enough to lend us her car and go on some shopping errands with us. We got a few overpriced items at West Marine and loaded up at the local Publix on salads and other perishable stuff that we were running low on.
Robber baron architecture as seen from the trolley tour.
We did eat quite well in St Augustine. Places I can recommend close to the marina (which has a convenient dinghy dock) include A1A Ale Works, OC Whites, Prohibition Kitchen and Ice Plant Bar & Grill. Ice Plant is the furthest from the marina but worth the journey. It was a suggestion from friends at home and it was delightful. A very strong cocktail list and food to match. Ale Works was kind of an local version of Capitol Ale with a slightly more varied menu, OC Whites a more traditional seafood joint most note-worthy for being like 10 steps from the marina and Prohibition Kitchen not only quite good, but located in the very entertaining St George's Street district which had all manner of amusements including fudge, mini-donuts that were a hybrid of funnel cake and donut, crepes, soft pretzels and ice cream. Did we eat all of these things? No. Did we eat most of these things? Mind your business.
My delightful dinner companions enjoying a pre-dinner drink at the Ice Plant
When I was trapped on the boat by bad weather, I sort of developed of habit of watching the sea birds. I somehow had an epiphany and discovered the name of cormorants lurking in the dark corners of my brain and I especially enjoy watching them. They just bob along on the water and once they spot a suitable fish, they do a kind of somersault and dive under for a surprisingly long time and almost always come up with a fishy snack. I also see loads of egrets, osprey, bald eagles and pelicans. I declared that pelicans were my spirit animal, because they are kind of fat and lumbering. Quite unlike the cormorant, they rarely seem to get more than a few inches below the water and they hit like a cannonball. They also really struggle to get off the water and air born again. They are also properly skittish, preferring to avoid humans who try to walk too close to them. I'm ready for some deserted islands myself.
Unlike the pelicans, this dude is fearless, preferring to keep his perch unless I look especially threatening
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