#2 The Oldest City

There is always something interesting to see while on the road. Sometimes in the campgrounds and sometimes along the road. Here is a camper towing a Fiat 500. Most manual transmission cars, like this one can be towed pretty easily.

Anne was walking the dog one evening a few days ago, and heard a loud crunch as she saw an RV make a tight turn around a 5 foot tall metal post in the campground. Unfortunately, it was a relatively new big rig.

Can’t criticize this guy, though, as our last RV suffered the same fate at a local gas station back home!

Then there was this truck coming right towards us!

Arriving in Atlanta, we visited with a former home town boy - our good friend, Sam, who retired when we did. Sam moved to Altanta to be near family and enjoy the moderate climate. We had to give Sam a lot of credit for finding our rig at McKinney Campground on this pitch black evening. Like many public campgrounds (this is a Corps of Engineers campground), this one is a little off the beaten path.

Idgy was a bit rude when Sam visited.

After 1102 miles and 7 days, we finally arrived at our campground in St. Augustine, Fl.

This park is located on an island across the Matanzas Bay from St. Augustine. Similar to other Florida campgrounds, Anastasia has large campsites that are pretty private. But getting the rig backed into our space was no mean feat. 

The park's four miles of beach and great sunsets are spectacular.

St. Augustine claims its fame from being the oldest continuously occupied city in the continental United States. Dating from a military base founded in 1565 by Admiral Pedro Menendez, the area was first explored in 1513 by Puerto Rican Governor, Juan Ponce de Leon. 

There are many historical attractions in the city, and we decided to start our visit at the site of the Fountain of Youth Archaeological Park. This dovetailed nicely with our need for some rejuvenation after the trip down. In addition to the Fountain, this privately managed attraction was the home of a tribe of friendly North American natives, the Timucuan tribe, and the site of the earliest Spanish exploration in 1513. This year the town is celebrating the 500^th year of its discovery.  Many archaeological digs were conducted in this area beginning at the start of the last century and continuing through today. In the 1930’s, the Smithsonian digs discovered the sites of many original buildings of both the Spanish settlers (square outlines below) and the natives (round), who occupied the area up to 4000 years before the Spaniards landed.

 

There are a number of recreated buildings and an Indian village as well as many artifacts, including some of the original water urns and cannon. 

Ponce de Leon  was mainly looking for gold, but when he found this friendly village of tall, robust Timucuans who drank from the many natural springs, he was sure that he had also discovered the legendary Fountain of Youth. Here Anne samples some of the restorative waters from the Fountain of Youth.

We couldn’t resist buying a bottle of water from the fountain, being filled here. 

The settlement location was chosen because it is right on the bay with swamps on one side, and easily defended.  We saw a firing demonstration of this breech loading cannon. Breech loaders were common in the mid 1500’s, but stopped being used 10 years later in favor of muzzle loaders. Not until the Civil War did they come into use again, because of their rapid load and firing capabilities. With 5-6 men servicing the cannon, it could fire three or four 6 pound balls per minute. The cannon shown here is the only one from this period in the US that is still in working condition. Watch with us as it is fired.

Since it was low tide, you could see numerous oysters sticking out of the mud on the swampy side of the settlement. They didn’t look so tasty to us!

 

Some birds and many peacocks were scattered throughout the park.

This interesting graphic in the shipwreck exhibit showed how the Spaniards’ horses were tied and hobbled for ship transport across the ocean.

Toward the end of our visit, Anne was feeling so good, she practically ran to the end of the 600 foot long pier for a view of the bay.

Doesn’t she look trimmer? Those restorative powers of the Fountain must be working ………