St. Augustine, Old City

We return to the city proper and quickly found our trolley stop. A word of caution here. The trolley is a very good way to get around to all the attractions some 'tourist traps' and historical sites BUT they are very uncomfortable. The streets are paved in brick and are very narrow, so the Trolley's bump over curbs a lot. They do give you lots of historical information, some human interest stuff and a lot of commercials for all the venues. Everywhere you go you have to pay, to see anything, and most entrance fees are pretty hefty, of course their are discount tickets and package deals, but it wears thin after the fifth repetition as you are bumped over another curb.  

The city it self is beautiful, the town has no large high rise modern buildings, flowers are still blooming and the town in decorated with Christmas lights.

After our walk and bumpy ride we called a cab and went to the local Publix for provisions. Our next few hops would bring us to Cocoa Florida where we can catch up with Dale and Patrica in S/V Nautical Dreamer.

Pedro Menéndez de Avilés sighted land on August 28, 1565. As this was the feast day of Augustine of Hippo, the territory was named San Agustín. The Spanish sailed through the St. Augustine Inlet into Matanzas Bay and disembarked near theTimucua town of Seloy on September 7. Menéndez's goal was to dig a quick fortification to protect his people and supplies as they were unloaded from the ships, and then to take a more proper survey of the area to determine the best location for the fort. The location of this early fort has been confirmed through archaeological excavations directed by Kathleen Deagan on the grounds of what is now the Fountain of Youth Archaeological Park.^[13] It is known that the Spanish occupied several structures in Seloy, the chief of which, known as Chief Seloy, was allied with the Saturiwa, Laudonnière's allies. It is possible, but undemonstrated, that Menéndez fortified one of the occupied Timucua structures as this first fort at Seloy.^[8] In the meantime, Jean Ribault, Laudonnière's old commander, arrived at Fort Caroline with more settlers for the colony, as well as soldiers and weapons to defend them. He also took over the governorship of the settlement. Despite Laudonnière's wishes, Ribault put most of these soldiers aboard his ships for an assault on St. Augustine. However, he was surprised at sea by a violent storm lasting several days. This gave Menéndez the opportunity to march his forces overland for surprise dawn attack on the Fort Caroline garrison, which then numbered several hundred people. Laudonnière and some survivors fled to the woods, and the Spanish killed almost everyone in the fort except for the women and children. With the French displaced, Menéndez rechristened the fort as San Mateo, and appropriated it for his own purposes. The Spanish then returned south and eventually encountered the survivors of Ribault's fleet near the inlet at the southern end of Anastasia Island. Menéndez executed most of the survivors, including Ribault; the inlet was thus named for the Spanish word for slaughters, matanzas.

The Fort at St. Augustine  the Castillo de San Marcos (British, Fort St. Marks) was renamed Fort Marion 

The tallest building in the city - now it is a Bank