From Brunswick, we went to Jacksonville, Florida. Jacksonville is in Duval County. The county was named after William Pope Duval, the first Governor of Florida Territory, and Penny's second cousin five times removed. If for no other reason, we were glad to see the area for which one of her family members was the namesake.
We arrived in Jacksonville in time for the big University of Florida/University of Georgia football game. Shortly after we arrived, the fans started pouring in. These three coaches were Gator fans.
The Georgia fans were not to be outdone. Between a couple of these coaches was a pavilion tent with what looked like a pretty good party going.
We waited until the game was over to see downtown Jacksonville. In this photo, a water taxi is passing a signature fountain. There is no old town Jacksonville to speak of. A fire in 1901 wiped out much of the city. 10,000 buildings were erected between 1901 and 1912. Most of those have since been razed and replaced by newer construction. Jacksonville was once considered the winter motion picture capital, but the conservative nature of the local politics along with the emergence of Hollywood put an end to that.
Andrew Jackson was the namesake of the city. He was highly esteemed in the area because he chased the warring Seminoles out of Eastern Florida.
We found these whimsical signs, placed around the downtown area quite delightful.
As you might expect, it takes a lot of power to keep all of those air conditioners running. In this complex are generators powered by coal, oil, natural gas, and biomass.
In the edge of Jacksonville is the Timucuan preserve, named after the local tribe of Native Americans. American beautyberries, such as these, were once a folk remedy used to repel biting insects. They are plentiful in this party of the country. The trees in the background ranged from two species of liveoaks, to at least three species of hickories, to longleaf pines, to baldcypress in wet areas, and were heavily festooned with Spanish Moss.
This reproduction of a Timucuan hut sits next to a pile of oyster shells, indicating a staple of their diet. 
This column is a reproduction of the column erected by the French Huguenot explorer Jean Ribault somewhere near this area.
There weren't a whole lot of people at this monument, but we had plenty of company. These little guys were everywhere.
Two years after the Ribault expedition, Rene Gaulaine de Laudonniere, seeing an opportunity for the French Huguenots to have a place of refuge where they could prosper, established Ft. Caroline, reproduced here. It was the first European settlement in the new world. Unfortunately, the following year, a Spanish force from nearby St. Augustine overran the fort, and killed virtually everyone here. It's unclear whether this was a reflection of the Spanish Inquisition of nearly 100 years earlier, or simply a pragmatic desire to not have to share this land with any other country.
This is the only entrance to the Castillo de San Marcos. Construction was initiated in 1568 after a pirate raid left the surrounding town of St. Augustine devastated. The moat over which these bridges are constructed is and was designed to be dry. During hostile action, the Spanish drove their cattle here to keep them from being stolen and give them some semblance of safety.
About the only type of rock available to build this fort was a local stone known as coquina. It is the compressed calcareous remains of millions of generations of small shelled organisms. In a few million years, this would have turned into limestone, but as it was, it was excellent for construction of a fort. When cannonballs struck this stone, rather than fracturing, a few inches of shells simply compressed into the numerous air spaces, and the projectile fell harmlessly to the ground.
This model illustrates the ingenious configuration of the fort. Cannons of the day could only be swiveled a few degrees. Despite this, overlapping fields of fire could cover any direction from the fort. It was never taken by hostile action.
Some of the cannons facing the Matanzas river line up in one of the corner bastions. During Spanish occupation, no soldiers lived within the fort. Rather, they lived in the surrounding community and came to work their twenty four to forty eight hour shift in the fort at the appropriate time. 
This a the view looking down from one of the corner bastions. The oven was placed outside the main walls of the fort. Having something like this anywhere near the powder magazine was not a particularly good idea.
Here, in old St. Augustine is an oyster shell tabby wall similar to that shown in an earlier blog entry from Savannah. We've seen quite a bit of this stuff in several places. What a great way to use locally available materials.
Another building in St. Augustine is shown here. Built over 200 years ago, it is billed as the oldest wooden schoolhouse in North America. Of course, Penny had to have a photo of it.
This is old town St. Augustine. During early English colonization, St. Augustine accepted runaway slaves as a part of the community. It later became a part of the underground railroad. Obviously, it has now become quite a tourist attraction. There are a number of neat little shops and great smelling restaurants down this street. I'll have to admit, we did leave a bit of money there.
Dating from some time before 1750, this house was once owned by an early Spanish Treasurer. Later, it was a home for Governor John Moultrie, brother of William Moultrie, namesake of Ft. Moultrie, SC, and a revolutionary war hero. The house finally become the property of a local physician who willed it to the city.
This is Ponce de Leon Hall of Flagler College. Built adjacent to old town St. Augustine, it was once the Ponce de Leon Hotel. One of the driving forces and large benefactors behind the hotel's conversion to an institution of higher education was Lawrence Lewis Jr, Grandson of Henry Flagler. Flagler was a partner in, and provided $100,000 dollars seed money for John D. Rockefeller's business venture which later became Standard Oil. Flagler is highly regarded in much of Florida since he also provided money for many Florida development projects.
This model illustrates the ingenious configuration of the fort. Cannons of the day could only be swiveled a few degrees. Despite this, overlapping fields of fire could cover any direction from the fort. It was never taken by hostile action.
Some of the cannons facing the Matanzas river line up in one of the corner bastions. During Spanish occupation, no soldiers lived within the fort. Rather, they lived in the surrounding community and came to work their twenty four to forty eight hour shift in the fort at the appropriate time. 
This a the view looking down from one of the corner bastions. The oven was placed outside the main walls of the fort. Having something like this anywhere near the powder magazine was not a particularly good idea.
Here, in old St. Augustine is an oyster shell tabby wall similar to that shown in an earlier blog entry from Savannah. We've seen quite a bit of this stuff in several places. What a great way to use locally available materials.
Another building in St. Augustine is shown here. Built over 200 years ago, it is billed as the oldest wooden schoolhouse in North America. Of course, Penny had to have a photo of it.
This is old town St. Augustine. During early English colonization, St. Augustine accepted runaway slaves as a part of the community. It later became a part of the underground railroad. Obviously, it has now become quite a tourist attraction. There are a number of neat little shops and great smelling restaurants down this street. I'll have to admit, we did leave a bit of money there.
Dating from some time before 1750, this house was once owned by an early Spanish Treasurer. Later, it was a home for Governor John Moultrie, brother of William Moultrie, namesake of Ft. Moultrie, SC, and a revolutionary war hero. The house finally become the property of a local physician who willed it to the city.
This is Ponce de Leon Hall of Flagler College. Built adjacent to old town St. Augustine, it was once the Ponce de Leon Hotel. One of the driving forces and large benefactors behind the hotel's conversion to an institution of higher education was Lawrence Lewis Jr, Grandson of Henry Flagler. Flagler was a partner in, and provided $100,000 dollars seed money for John D. Rockefeller's business venture which later became Standard Oil. Flagler is highly regarded in much of Florida since he also provided money for many Florida development projects.
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