St Augustine
16 December 2010
Bob
Puffin continued south under a warm and soothing sunshine as she nudged into the mooring field at St. Augustine, Florida. Temperatures lifted to near 70 degrees, rekindling our enthusiasm for the south after the brutal cold snap. This is the south that had lured us south!
Shedding clothes to the appropriate level, we dinghied into town for a closer look at "oldest, continuously occupied, European-established city and port in the continental U.S." Wikipedia's long-winded parsing of the city's birth goes on to specify 1565. Other sources simply say America's oldest city.
The "Castillo de San Marcos" is a massive fortress completed by the Spanish about 1700. It still dominates a portion of the waterfront today and was responsible for repulsing numerous, but unsuccessful incursions by the British and the French. It remained under Spanish dominion until 1763 and the Treaty of Paris when the British took over and Spain colonial ambitions focused on Cuba.
The early Spanish and Moorish architectural influence is today what gives St. Augustine much of it charm and we marveled at the massive but detailed appearance of some of the early twentieth century buildings in the historic district last night as we continued walking around. Ensconced in this district are an incredible number of shops and boutiques, even shops within shops. The trees in the central park and elsewhere were stunningly draped with festive lights for the holiday season
The banner picture was shot at one of the sumptuous homes that line portions of the waterway as Puffin slipped toward St. Augustine. When a large home is already immaculately landscaped to a fare-thee-well, then the truly artistic landscaper discards restraint, grabs his handy hedge trimmer and make an eight-foot horticultural statement. Masterful!