We slept in, of course, and planned our day over coffee. Task #1, take a guided trolley ride around town to orient ourselves. We find this a good way to find out more about a town without actually working at it. Plan after trolley ride: Tour historic fort, lunch in colonial area of city, tour Whetstone chocolate factory, tour St. Augustine distillery.
The Castillo de San Marcos has guarded St. Augustine since 1672. It is the tenth fort built on the site. After the preceding nine were burned down, the Spanish finally ponied up the money to make the fort out of stone. The fort was built in the form of a four pointed star.
If your buddies in the point over there were being attacked, you could rake the attacker's lines with enfilade fire.
Web site: https://www.nps.gov/casa/index.htm
Lunch was at the Bull and Crown Public House.
Touring the Whetstone Chocolate company. Don't know what the machine did, but I wanted to put my finger in the stream.
The tour and tasting at the St. Augustine Distillery was double fun. We met a couple from Lansing, Joe and Sally, and their friend Mary. We all vowed to re-connect when we returned to GR in December. We also tasted some very nice bourbon, two rums, vodka, and two gins. One of the gins was aged in French vermouth barrels for a short while. Kind of like a martini in a bottle.
View of two pot stills.
Joe and Sally were kind enough to take the liquor that we bought, and take it back to MI for us. Very nice people whom we hope to see soon, and not just because they have our booze.
Today's ride was a blast. First of all, we had to take this picture:
You know what we're talkin' about.
On the way out of town, we stopped at the St. Augustine Alligator Farm. http://www.alligatorfarm.com/ This was a totally cool place. If you are anywhere near it, you should go.
Entering the farm, this greeted us. It is fiberglass, but made me jump none the less.
We took too many pictures, but go to the web site if you can't go in person.
After over two hours at the Alligator Farm, we got going on the road. We had a 4-6 mph quartering tail wind, and a pretty much dead flat road, so the miles flew by. Still on a barrier island, so the ocean is always there.
Obviously, sometimes the ocean becomes overly friendly and pays a visit. Some folks have figured out how to prepare for that.
Tomorrow we ride 46 miles along the shore to Edgewater, FL. Should be another fun day. We will send warm thoughts to our friends in Michigan who are about to get snow.
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