The sunshine state

Another couple of miles and time already for another state park! This time the land set aside for public enjoyment includes several miles of gleaming white sands that made Grayton Beach State Park a highlight of the trip.

You can find shade in the thick shrubs that grow atop the dunes, or you can hit the shore to soak up the sun. The beach was blissfully quiet with maybe two dozen sunseekers tops, including this fisherman.

It was a perfect day with no breeze, a light surf, bright sunshine and acres of space to wander barefoot along the shoreline.

Near this slice of natural perfection is an architect's idea of the perfect planned community, the resort of Seaside.

The designers of the town turned their backs on the car culture which has left so much of suburban America a bland conglomeration of strip malls, parking lots and tin shed shops.

Instead, one of the key features of Seaside is that everything is within walking distance. After parking up at the town square it was easy to stroll past the shops, into a cafe, along the beach and around the residential area.

Planning regulations are quite strict; buildings are restricted to specific colours and a limited number of architectural styles.

To me, this uniformity made the place feel even more like a suburban subdivision, albeit one with sand instead of sidewalks. No wonder it was the setting for The Truman Show!

Leaving Seaside, we hit terrible traffic and endured a long slog down Highway 98 past the enormous resorts around Destin. With the hot glare of the sun in my eyes, we could hardly spot the sea anymore for all the hotels and shopping malls.

At last we pulled into Pensacola, which to be honest was a bit of a letdown. It took ages to find the historic downtown, which was almost empty and not that attractive.

It was pretty in parts though and positively glowed in the late afternoon sun.

I am a sucker for raking light, when it makes even a department store's lettering look like this!

It's time at last to bid farewell to Florida and make tracks for the redneck Riviera of Alabama!

Backwoods Florida 3

Florida may only be a fair-to-middling sized state (America's 26th largest) but its panhandle is over 350 miles from end to end. There's even a change in time zone along the way. Add in lots of back road detours and no wonder it had taken us two days to reach Marianna after leaving St Augustine.

One of the many sights inviting visitors to pull off Interstate 10 is Falling Waters State Park, where a stream leaps into a seemingly bottomless pit. Here we are staring into the brink.

The sinkhole is 20-feet wide and 100-feet deep. Geologists have yet to determine where the water disappers off to. For some reason I've not saved a photo of the falls themselves, but I suppose once you've seen some water falling off steep rocks, you've seen it all.

The rest of the park is a low-key affair, mainly pine woods threaded with hiking trails...

...and this quiet lake which was mirror-calm first thing that morning.

The pamphlet for the park invites campers to set up tent atop one of Florida's highest hills, a peak of alpine proportions that soars 324 feet into the air. Fearing altitude sickness, we drove on to another geological curiosity, an almost perfectly-round lake which is surrounded by the town of DeFuniak Springs. Want proof?

Encircled by Victorian homes plus gleaming churches and civic buildings, the circular lake is a lovely water feature few other towns of this size can match.

The adjacent downtown had many beautiful shopfronts...

...plus some interesting local businesses, including a used bookstore where I loaded up on a few of the trashy sci-fi novels I remembered reading as a teen.

Later that day we visited an even more surreal town (Stepford itself personified), the resort of Seaside. But first we had time for a brief detour to Eden Gardens State Park, with its graceful plantation home.

A spot to hitch up your hoop skirts and sit down with a mint julep if there ever was!

Again, this is another low-key park with not much to see or do except stretch your legs on a stroll around the gardens with its views over the bay. By now the sun was beating down, so it was time to hit the beach!

Backwoods Florida 2

Leaving the shores of the Suwannee, we hopped onto Interstate 10 westbound and made tracks for Tallahassee. Circling Florida's capital city on the ring road, we saw no point in pulling over and instead headed 15 miles south from here to Wakulla Springs State Park.

Somewhere underneath the Florida pines, it's as if someone has walked off and left the taps running. An astonishing quarter of a million gallons of fresh water bubble out of 25 miles of underwater caves here, making Wakulla one of the world's deepest and most productive natural springs.

A placid lake marks the mouth of the springs, which is the source of the 9-mile Wakulla River. The first few miles of the river is a pristine wildnerness with no fishing, hunting or hiking. The only access is with a park ranger aboard one of their boats.

The place is no backwoods backwater, though. In the 1930s a luxurious lodge was built nearby and the surrounding forests served as the African jungle for a number of Tarzan movies. These days the movie cameras are long gone, but the lodge still offers fine food in its ballroom restaurant, as well as overnight accommodation.

We had a light lunch and enjoyed a view of the gardens which teemed with sparrows, mockingbirds and red cardinals.

Far more exotic wildlife awaited us on our boat safari. For an extra $8 there are regular ranger tours which last an hour and cruise about a mile along the river. Alligator sightings are guaranteed!

Almost immediately after pulling away from the dock, the ranger cut the engine and pointed at a brown blob beneath the water - a manatee! It dove deeper and disappeared, quite unconcerned by us. The park's boats are the only ones allowed on the water and none of the animals took a blind bit of notice as we cruised past.

Our ranger guide pointed out an osprey in the trees tearing into a fish for lunch. A diving bird popped its head up from the water like a periscope to catch its breath. Moorhens sat amongst waterlilies, fish jumped out of the water and alligators sunned themselves on logs.

We spotted several varieties of herons, cormorants and ducks amongst the reeds and cypress trees. The ranger explained some of their habits, like how an anhinga needs to dry its feathers after each dive (good luck, it was overcast today).

Right when we thought the show was over and the dock was in sight, we floated past an entire family of manatees, including a baby that broke the surface for a breath of air.

I don't see how these sea cows inspired the mermaid legends, but then we had only been on the boat for an hour...

By the way, the Friends of Wakulla Springs are raising money to refurbish the fleet of boats that ferry visitors around the springs. It only takes a couple clicks to make a donation with your PayPal account and they deserve every cent you can afford!

Leaving Wakulla Springs, we took the coastal road to Bald Point where we pulled over to stretch our legs. The sky glowered and threatened rain, the sea was brown and churning.

The shoreline was littered with the shells of horseshoe crabs, then we spotted this live pair in the surf.
Still heading west, we found ourselves on the bulge of Florida's panhandle, called the 'Forgotten Coast' fpr its empty beaches. The road went through thick forests and past gorgeous strands of sand which would have been magnificent in the sun, but instead were hidden in rain and mist. At least there were no condos or casino hotels marring the view.

This made for an atmospheric journey to the small town of Apalachicola, which is approached along a long straight causeway. Following the road are a string of pylons on which perched hundreds of birds. There was nowhere to pull over for a look, so here's a terrible out-of-focus shot taken from inside the car.

Dropping down into Apalachicola, the town looked quite inviting with its working port, a thriving downtown district and lots of independent eateries. We could have easily spent a day or two here, but it was getting dark and starting to rain even more, plus we had another 80 miles to drive before reaching our hotel.

Perhaps not the best time to mention that backwoods Florida is where they filmed Jeepers Creepers...

Coming up, we watch The Descent at the hotel and decide against a trip to Florida Caverns State Park. Luckily there is plenty more to see as we continue to head west, including the state's highest waterfall and a small town built around a perfect circle of a lake.

Backwoods Florida

Jumping ahead now, because I've already typed up northeast Florida. St Augustine was perfection, but the rest of the day didn't pan out as well. A recommended local restaurant (Salt Water Cowboys) wasn't open for lunch so we went to a Chilis instead. We've been many times and it's usually a treat but on this particular occasion the service was slow, we could hardly find the food for all the cheese melted on top of it and the sports broadcasts were too overbearing.

We were behind schedule leaving St Augustine so had no time for the Palatka Ravine. Then, we arrived at Paynes Prairie right as the trailhead car parks were being shut for the evening, which meant we could only see the basin from the roadside boardwalk. So no chance of spotting any buffalo, wild horses or sandhill cranes that make this one of Florida's richest wildlife preserves.

To make up time we hopped on Interstate 75 and made tracks for Lake City. As you may have gathered by now, a lot of our itinerary revolves around food and chosing Lake City for an overnight stay was no accident. The town is home to a Texas Roadhouse and despite the restaurant being a national chain, we made a point of tracking one down because of their Unique Selling Points we had heard so much about.

First off, there are buckets of peanuts at every table, with mounds of shells scattered on the floor. You instantly think - Wild West saloon. Kick back and take it easy, y'all. It took us a few minutes to break the habit of thousands of years of civilisation before letting a shell fall to the floor though.

Next, they don't do lunch because they spend all morning baking bread, marinating meat and sweeping up peanut shells.

Finally, it's all about having the meal the way you like it, with a staggering array of sides. I ordered sweet potato with my steak, expecting a small mound of mash, but ended up with a whole enormous baked sweet potato. With three choices of topping. They even do different whipped butters, including the cinnamon option which comes with hot rolls which was... novel.

They serve plenty of tasteless American lagers by the score, but the waiter was able to recommend a Blue Moon ale when we asked for something different.

I was disappointed though with my filet medallions. The meat was gristly and the mushroom sauce far too salty, so much so I couldn't finish it. Christian had yet another chicken meal, but said he enjoyed his chicken breast, mashed potato and mixed veg with a gravy. It was all fairly cheap, the atmosphere was fun, the staff were delightful and we would go again to try something different.

The next morning we had breakfast at Lake City's downtown old-fashioned drugstore diner complete with bar stools occupied by the local old folks downing bottomless cups of coffee. We had scrambled eggs, toast and pancakes that tasted suspiciously of Bisquick.

The next state park on the map was the Suwannee River, an iconic name of the American South if there ever was. Unfortunately there had been a recent flood which rendered most of the trails impassable, plus it was an overcast day so I wasn't able to take any interesting photos. We had a look at 'that Suwannee shore' and strained our ears for the sound of banjos before hitting the road again.

Luckily things went far more swimmingly at our next stop of the day, where we boarded a boat for a wildlife safari. Stay tuned for photos of yet more alligators, plus a family of manatees!

Just photos: St Augustine's Alligator Farm

Not far outside of St Augustine is the famous Alligator Farm. As you would expect in America's oldest city, this is one of America's oldest zoos and dates back to 1893.

Crocodile Dundee would have a field day here. It is the world's only complete collection of all 23 species of crocodiles and their cousins. That's right, there are nearly 2 dozen kinds of alligators scattered over 5 continents.

Luckily, none are native to England.

I have to admit this was the first time I balked at an admission price on our trip...$21.95 for me to see some crocs?? It turned out to be worth it because they have some amazing animals on view and it's possible to take some terrific wildlife shots.

We had missed the alligator feeding, but we were told that if we hurried we'd be in time to see the snake show. No thanks. Because it's not just crocs! They have komodo dragons, African vultures, monkeys, macaws and giant tortoises too.

Alligators though are the main attraction. The rare species from overseas are kept to one side, while the more common local gators sun themselves in the lagoon or lurk in the swamp.

A boardwalk across the swamp leads to a viewing platform of the herons, egrets, storks and other wading birds that nest out of harm's way.

If you are visiting, be sure to book in advance through this website or print the voucher from this link - either way you'll save $1 off each ticket.




Thanks to the magic of a zoom lens, the alligators looked close enough to touch but were actually a safe distance away.

I hope.



There were several giant tortoises gumming on dried grass, a bit like snacktime at the senior center!

Don't worry, the little guys are kept in a separate pool from the alligators to keep them from becoming a crunchy snack.

Maximo, the largest croc in the park, is kept behind toughened glass. All 15 feet of him.

I hope.

Gotcha!

A morning in St Augustine

We found the streets of St Augustine were much quieter first thing on Monday morning once the weekenders were gone. In case you're wondering, we had the stayed the night at the Days Inn, which I do recommend.

First stop was breakfast at the Spanish Bakery. This was so satisfying, we had another breakfast at The Bunnery about 10 minutes later.

The Spanish Bakery has been in business for nearly 30 years. This can only be down to its prime location, judging by its meagre selection of forlorn meat pies, sausage rolls, pastries and cookies served up in a dark shed.

My cinnamon swirl had heavy lumps of burnt sugar welded to a crusty, dry roll. At that time of morning it was popular with the road cleaning crew and I half-wondered if they had emptied their sweepings onto the counter.

Further down the street we found a fun diner called The Bunnery which had lots of local photos on the walls and a fine selection of pastries and coffee.

I was very happy with the decaff cappucino, key lime pie and cheesecake brownie.

St Augustine was lovely in the cool morning air and raking light.

We ventured along some back streets for a peek at the old residences here.

The oldest building in town though is the Castilo de San Marcos, a massive Spanish fortress with stone walls 14-feet thick and 35-feet high.

A proper 'bastion' it has a square courtyard with diamond points at each corner, sat within a ditch and star-shaped walls. You can see this from above with my aerial shots thanks to my helicopter ride which you will find below in an older post.

With foundations dating back to 1672, it is the oldest stone fortress on the continent. Inside you will find the de rigueur introductory film and a series of plain rooms left undecorated except for centuries-old graffiti.

A soldier's life was hard and the building was a remote outpost...so no, there is not much to look at inside!

On top of the ramparts there is quite a view over the town and harbour...

plus a line of magnificent old cannon.

If only I had kept my cinnamon bun from the Spanish Bakery, it would have made a fine cannonball!