I am writing this in a marina (!!!) in Charleston, SC. Haven't seen even half of Charleston, so I will write about it tomorrow, after our horse-drawn carriage tour. So although it is backtracking, but I must tell you about St. Augustine, a pretty little town.
You see some spanish influence here and there in the U.S., but St. Augustine has kept it real. The spanish had a life here, they grew crops, defended their territory, spun their yarns, baked their bread, raised more little Spaniards. The held this place for good while until they had to cede it the British, just before the Revolution, ten, of course, it became part of The Union. The boast of St. Augustine is that it is the oldest, continuously occupied city in America. The first photo is of Fort Matanzas. Incidentally, the new photo on the header is taken just off Fort Matanzas, you can almost get an idea of the expansive view the Spanish soldiers had. We got closed in by a weird rain sqall before I could take some better pix, oh well. The building material is called Coquina, cut out of sedimented shell and sand stone, its properties include being cannon-ball proof! The enemy called off the only attack ever launched here because they could see the balls going in, but couldn't see any damage baing done. Cool stuff!
A man called Flagler decided, in about 1920, to make a resort town out of St. Augustine. All the edifice pictures are of his hotels, except the church. He kept the Spanish theme, which you just don't see that often. Contrary to America's desire to keep up appearances of total victory, Flagler, in his way, said, Yes. This is indeed our heritage, and we should be proud of it!
If you ever come here, you will find tourist traps, but also the authentic feel of the times.
The lighthouse is truly amazing! The original house produced light with a huge fire at the top of a tower. This house was built around 1890, using brick, cast iron and wood. It's not often we get to tour these beauties all the way to the top, most are regulated the Coast Guard (I think) and will not permit the public to climb the stairs. This one was saved from demolition by a local group, and in order to do so, they had to agree to keep it open for public tours. The resulting facility and grounds are quite nice. The pictures include the staircase, shot from the bottom, and the beautiful Class 4 Fresnel lens, a real work of art. The light itself went from kerosine to electric bulb in 1930, click on the photo of the lens above for a great (if I do say so!) sight of the bulb. Some of the excerpts from the Lightkeeper's Log include storms, hurricanes, a vandal shooting and breaking part of the lens (bastards!) and an earthquake that had the poor man thinking he was going to die! He must have thought, "Geez! Is this how I am thanked for lugging kerosine by bucket up all these stairs for all these years?"And of course the view from the top made the 217 steps worth the effort! The stairs, being cast-iron, are the see-through kind and give the climber a sense of vertigo. Then you had to step out onto the observation walk-way, which was maybe 5 feet wide and surrounded by a waist-high bar. I found it easier to walk around the deck at the Empire State Building! The beauty of the craftsmanship was lovely to see!
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