\To the Coast!

And now the long run to St Augustine Florida…

Through the rest of Alabama, and across Southern Georgia, stopping only to get peaches. Ok, some peach pie too. Oh, and I like that Peach Cider and a jar of peach salsa please!

DON’T SLIP ON A PEACH

A quick wave to the Burtons up North, and before you know it, we are in Florida. I have never been a big fan of Florida. I don’t like the politics there and find them to be the opposite of the America we aspire to be. But every time I’ve been there I have absolutely loved it, and this was no exception.

St Augustine was one of our destination cities, thanks to Joe Eaton, who convinced us that it must not be missed. It is the oldest continuously occupied European settlement in the US, according to Joe, and its old style Spanish architecture is charming. Narrow streets in the old town gave us some shade in the heat as we walked through the cobbled alleys past cafes, galleries, museums, and pubs, and even the tacky tourist part couldn’t damper the Colonial feel. Right on the waters’ edge sits a real old Spanish fort, we mean real old, like 1695. It has gone from the Spanish to the British, back to Spain, then to the US, then to the Confederates, and o back to the US again. It was here that we had our 4th of July celebration.

We have seen fireworks before, of course, but these were several notches above anything previous. They lasted a full 30 minutes, to the applause of many thousands of people, many families grilling outdoors, playing frisbee, soccer, and just tossing the football around. The main thoroughfares were closed off as throngs of people entered, then made their exit at the end of the evening… without a hitch ( you can tell they have done this before )

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/e1b975_422191ea4e684b98a55f67f1b0031351/file