St. Augustine, Florida

In late June we drove to St. Augustine with Nathan, Sara and her friend Spencer. The first mistake I made was thinking it was a 5 hour drive and it was more then 6 1/2 hours from our home. We used Garmin to assist us in finding our condo and he failed us when he told us " You have arrived at your destination" about 5 miles from the actual location. When you depend on a GPS and it fails you it is frustrating and the only option is going back to the old fashioned method of asking people for directions - Loraine is the queen in that category. So we finally found the place very late at night and the young man at the guard station was not much help getting us to the actual unit. I knew we were close but for some reason I decided that it was behind us and started going backwards at a good pace when suddenly BANG followed by a sliding along the pavement noise which made me scared, Loraine to scream and me to stop immediately. Okay that was my second mistake driving backwards... The midget speed limit sign in the MIDDLE OF THE ROAD took a hit but we were able to put it back together and it ended up being right by the condo we were renting...which meant it was a sign - that is a joke - of course it was a sign and it was in the middle of the road.
We were all very hungry and started to do some quick research for something to eat in the St. Augustine area- the wireless internet was nice. At 1:30 AM the options were Denny's or eat at a 24-hour gas station. I have done the later in Paris once so we chose the former and I am not sure if it was any better then the gas station option. We were in sort of a giddy mood as everything around us made as laugh but really it helped us deal with the dirtiest Denny's I have ever seen - I actually looked for the cleanliness rating system that is commonly used in Georgia but I could not see anything posted and that is probably a good thing as it would have been in single digits (out of 100) and I have a personal goal not to eat at something less then 90.
We ended up seeing all the sights over the next few days...you know some of these tourist things are really reaching but I guess we are as dense as the next tourist as we would pay to see the oldest jail, the oldest school house, the oldest home (with a lot of caveats) and several other sites that would not have been missed if someone just burnt them down. We went to the fountain of youth that Ponce De Leon discovered which has water bubbling out of the ground that tasted terrible which is pretty much the same taste of water everywhere else in St. Augustine. My favorite things were the Castillo de San Marcos which was the fort that Spain used to protect its empire in the new world and the alligator farm which showed numerous gators in various sizes, shapes and colors from all over the world.
I usually enjoy drinking water when I eat but we all had a problem with the drinking water and had to either get bottled water (which some places do not carry) or drink soda so we were lucky that we had a cooler with us that held a lot of cold water bottles.
One night the kids were playing in the ocean and a couple came by walking with flashlights and as they shined it in my face they told me that it was the sharks feeding time. I causally told Loraine that it was the shark feeding time and she had them out of there in an instant - I did note however that there was nobody else in the water on the beach. I wonder what made those people shark experts? Loraine has a serious fear of flying over water, crashing and getting eaten by a shark. I have told her on several occasions that if the plane ever crashes there will be no survivors and sharks may be eating all the dead bodies which has never consoled her.
We spent the last night in the Casa Monica which is right in the heart of St. Augustine and is considered a pretty nice hotel. It was nice alright but not the type of accommodation that I feel most comfortable with - a little stuffy. I was impressed with the crown molding in our room as it had a round ceiling and looked like a real challenge to custom fit.
Being that we were by the ocean Loraine hoped to have some good seafood a few times while we were there but that did not happen. Everywhere we went claimed to have good seafood but only if you like deep fried shrimp or fish-sticks or something else from the sea deep fried...hey I can get Captain D's in Topeka, Kansas. That was a major disappointment but I still think such a place must exist in St. Augustine but we did not find them or it.
On the way home we had to stop so Spencer could try boiled peanuts and he was not impressed as shown on his face. They actually were not good boiled peanuts as they had probably been boiling since early spring and were water-logged. I would not say I like boiled peanuts but I have had them enough to know that there are tolerable boiled peanuts and we did not have any of those. Nathan did not even try them as he has experienced BP's in the past.