.

March 2, 2013 Day 295

St. Augustine Municipal Marina
St. Augustine, FL
Total miles to date: 4979.8

Our trolley ride

Today was dedicated to touring St. Augustine and Chuck and Becky arrived around 10:00 to join us! We started by riding one of the narrated “hop on-hop off” trolley rides around the historic area.  St. Augustine, founded in 1565, is the oldest continuously occupied European settlement in the country.  The trolley makes over 22 stops, but we stayed on the ride for many of them and listened to the history (such as the Fountain of Youth, the oldest jail, the oldest house (1704), and the Castillo de San Marcos).  

Memorial Presbyterian Church

Interior of church

Flagler College



We did get off the trolley at the Memorial Presbyterian Church, built by Henry Flagler in 1890 as a memorial to his daughter who died giving birth.  Flagler was a founding partner of the Standard Oil Trust.  The architecture of the church is a Venetian Renaissance style, with a Byzantine dome. There are 92 stained glass windows which contain the Apostles Creed.  We plan to attend church services there tomorrow morning.

From there, we walked to the elegant former Ponce de Leon Hotel built in 1887 by Henry Flagler, which is now home to Flagler College. We then walked to the San Sebastian Winery, where we had lunch and then participated in a wine tasting.  We resumed the trolley ride through the city and came back to the marina.

Dinner with Chuck and Becky at Amici's

After relaxing on the boat for a few hours (and getting warm –this was a cold, windy day!), we drove to Amici’s for dinner and had good Italian food.  We came back to the historic area and walked down Aviles Street and then found ice cream.  We ended the evening by relaxing on the boat after a fun day touring this historic city.