Yum, Chocolate!

An early morning  phone call reserved tow places on the 2:15pm tour at Whetstone Chocolate Factory today.  Bikes on the back, we jumped into the car and drove the 5.4 miles into St. Augustine on another beautiful day; temperature 85 degrees, humidity 44%.

Whetstone Chocolates are "artisanal" chocolates - small production, only 6 chocolatiers in a factory the size of two basketball courts. Across the alley is the factory store and there are two other stores; one in the historic district downtown and one on St . Anastasia Island (we saw it yesterday).

Small factory store where be began our tour.

There were only 6 in our tour group and 15 is the limit per tour.  We learned so much about the growing, harvesting and processing of chocolate from our tour guide, Ty.

An animated Ty.

A sifter on the right to remove stones, twigs, and bits of shell from the cocoa beans. On the left is a cocoa bean roaster, same as a coffee roaster.

After the explanation of the processing - from tree to cocoa powder, plus sugar, vanilla, cocoa butter and emulsifiers - we moved on to the production of the candy.

Mona running the machine that puts the colored foil on the individual shell chocolate pieces that can be any type of chocolate from milk chocolate to 72% dark chocolate, to flavored (mint, key lime, orange,etc.).

64% chocolate shell candies coming off the machine. Mona can run 5,000/hour through her machine.

Whetstone's also makes fudge of all flavors.

Rocky road fudge made this morning.

Peanut butter, mint, white chocolate, chocolate nut, etc. pans of fudge ready to be cut and sold.

It was a great tour (we all wore hair nets like Mona's) and we were able to taste 6 different types of chocolate. Our tour ticket included a coupon for $2 off a purchase in the store.  

We left the car parked in their parking lot and took the bikes for a return to the St. Augustine historic district. Here are some pictures.

George Street, a pedestrian only street.  Reminds me of New Orleans.

There were these "alleys" off of George Street.

The old city gates with palm trees logs for walls.

Close up of the city gates made of, you guessed it, coquina.

View of the city gates from the other side - looking down George Street.

View of the outside of the fort from the sea wall.  The city of St. Augustine is below sea level.

Horse drawn carriages line the sea wall waiting to provide a tour.

Lions at the beginning of the bridge.

After touring the Historic part of the city we returned to the car in the Whetstone Chocolate parking lot and stopped in for a gelato, which they make (I had key lime and Frederick has chocolate hazelnut) and some chocolate to take home.

I agree!

One last picture of a store that caused us to think of Mary and Renn.

St. Augustine has something for everyone.

Humm.

Tomorrow is a travel day.  We will be leaving in the morning for Savannah.  

Coquina

This morning we went back up to Jacksonville to the REI store (third time!) to pick up our newly tuned bikes and settle on a bike carrier. We decided on the original one but not without giving each of them a thorough look over and test drive. The one we have will fit nicely in the back of the car when we are hitched to the airstream.

There it is on the right - white tubes with red accents. 

We took this opportunity to do some house cleaning of the back of the car. I think that will be a frequent occurrence as we figure out what we need and what we don't.  We moved the two suitcases into the Airstream and put them under the bed. One is completely empty and the other one has some cooler weather clothing in it.  I think we'll try to send the empty suitcase back to Kathryn's basement. ( I don't know what we would do without Kathryn's basement - what she has left of it!)

This afternoon we wanted to take our bikes out for a spins so we went to Anastasia Island, just across the Bridge of Lions from St. Augustine, for a visit to the Anastasia State Park. We didn't realize that the Bridge of Lions was a drawbridge until we got on it and then had to stop for the bridge to open for a sailboat to pass under.

We had to wait for about seven to eight minutes.

Frederick jumped out to take this picture of a couple of historic ships moored next to the bridge.

Anastasia State Park has a lovely beach

Lovely beach.

and a view of the lighthouse.

Find the lighthouse!

 One of the reasons we wanted to go to the park is because it is the site of an old Spanish quarry for Coquina.  This stone is of great significance because without the rock, Spain might have lost St. Augustine, and Florida, as a colony. Or, the ancient town of St. Augustine might have been abandoned, left to fade from Florida's history. Instead there is beautiful, historic St. Augustine!

Coquina (Spanish for "tiny shellfish") is a component of the sedimentary limestone called the Anastasia Formation.  The formation extends from the northern end of Anastasia Island south some 250 miles to Palm Beach. Locally it reaches up to 30 miles inland to the west. It can be as much as 50 feet thick.

The Anastasia Formation was formed when much of Florida's present coastline was under the sea.  During the Pleistocene Epoch (1,800,000 to 10,000 years ago) worldwide glaciers repeatedly formed and melted, causing sea levels to rise and fall. On Florida's Atlantic coast, when the sea level was high, shells, quartz, sand, and clay accumulated as beaches and offshore bars. When the sea level dropped, these bars emerged as offshore islands. As rainwater seeped through the exposed deposits, it leached calcium carbonate from the shells. Calcium carbonate cemented the loose deposits together to form the coquina stone. The coquina deposits date back over 100,000 years.

In 1970 the Anastasia quarry was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in recognition of coquina stone's contribution to the settlement of St. Augustine.  To preserve this unique area and remaining coquina strata, no further mining has been permitted. In the decades that have passed, many natural changes have occurred. Due to erosion of the topsoil at the edges, some trees have collapsed into the pit.  Decaying vegetation and sediment now pave the quarry floor. Once porous, the exposed coquina has hardened and water cannot seep through. Except in times of drought, the sediment remains wet. 

The quarry as it looks today.

Coquina stone on the quarry floor.

Coquina stone used in the gates to the quarry.

Tomorrow it's back to St. Augustine and some more exploring.

(This post is dedicated to Peter, the geologist.)

Oldest everything

St. Augustine lays claim to being the first permanent settlement (1565) on the North American continent, beating Jamestown by 42 years. The Spanish held Florida until 1763, regained it after the American Revolution, then in 1821, finally sold it to the United States. Because of this long time hold on St. Augustine, it retains a Spanish feel.

Today we took a guided tour, on a trolly, and saw a lot of "the oldest...." The oldest wooden schoolhouse, oldest house, oldest pharmacy, oldest oak tree (nicknamed the Old Senator), etc. We did all this on the oldest trolley tour in St. Augustine.

I didn't take a lot of pictures of St. Augustine because we want to go back and revisit some of the places we just travelled by. One such place is a tour of the Whetestone's Chocolate factory. I don't think it is the oldest anything, but it is located in one of the old wharf warehouses .

We spent a fair amount of time at Castillo de San Marcos, which is under the direction of the National Park Service.  Getting a handle on the history of the fort provides a nice understanding of the history of the City of St. Augustine as well as the history of the state of Florida.

The Bridge of Lions - from St. Augustine to Matanzas Island and the lighthouse. There are two marble lions at the beginning of the bridge.

Exterior of the Castillo de San Marcos.

Close-up of the stone blocs that the fort is built from. It is called Coquina, a unique sedimentary rock that is partly formed from shells.

This fort is much smaller than the one on Dry Tortugas.

This is Alan who provided a nice historic tour of the fort.  His family lives in East Greenwich, a couple of houses down from Lincoln Chafee' house.

In 1702, during a siege of St. Augustine, 1400 people lived in this fort for nearly three months.

During our tour of the fort, out in the river, we could see and hear a reenactment of a pirate ship firing on a merchant ship. Puffs of smoke from the cannon firing and loud shooting of a boarding party. Very exciting!

This is the pirate ship that moved awfully fast for not having any sails up.

This is a replica of the seal that was placed at the entrance of the fort. The original is under glass in an exhibit room in the fort.  It represents Castile and Leon which formed modern Spain.

Oldest oak tree.

Peacock, who nicely spread his tail when the trolly driver rang his bell, on the grounds of the "Foutain of Youth"

Deja vu

This morning was a work morning. I cleaned the Airstream and Frederick worked on assembling the new bike rack.

It's white so it blends well with the car. We'll take the red label off if....

Bikes ready to go in for a tune-up.

One of the first places we wanted to take the bikes was in to REI for a check -up.  They have been bumped around a bit so we wanted everything to be oiled or adjusted so that the bikes take us where we want to go and not fight us.

On the way to Jacksonville we stopped at the beach, right across the street from the driveway into our campground.

It was a perfect day. Temperature around 80; humidity 42%: and, virtually no wind.

Back at REI we were introduced to another type of bike rack. We are now evaluating which will work better for our needs.  My main concern is that the rack not take up too much room when it has to be stored in the back of the car while we are towing the Airstream.

We just came back inside from looking at stars using the new app Sky Guide. We used both the iPhone and the iPad.  Of note, we saw Mars, again, and Jupiter, along with a host of other constellations.

North Beach

The North Beach Camp Resort is our new home for the next five days. It is a spectacular location on a barrier island on the north end of St. Augustine. Today was moving day and once we got going the drive (123 miles) was uneventful and the scenery on highway #95 was lush and green. The part of the island where we are located is probably only about a quarter of a mile wide. One end of the campground fronts the river, or estuary, and the other end is on route A1A, with the Atlantic Ocean on the other side of the road.

After we unhitched we drove in Jacksonville.  There is only one REI store in Florida and that is in Jacksonville.  What we have realized is that although we have a bike carrier on the rear of the Airstream, if we want to take our bikes on one of our excursions, we need some way of transporting them. So we identified a light weigh Yakima bike carrier available from REI. Off we went. While we were at REI for the bike carrier we also got two day-packs. We will use them for both bike riding and hiking.

The friendly and helpful store manager helping us at REI.

I hope to have pictures of our new campsite and adjacent area tomorrow.

Astronaut Frederick

To complete our visit to Space Coast we returned to Merritt Island and the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame. While the Kennedy Space Center was about rockets and space missions, the Astronaut Hall of Fame is all about the human experience. There are astronaut exhibits with personal memorabilia and a number of hands-on displays. It's a little dated with much more about the Apollo missions and less about the space shuttle.  However there was a bit about the future and the exploration of Mars.

Actual capsule from the third earth orbiter. 

Astronaut Frederick.

Mars - which you can currently see in the eastern sky in the early evening.

Detail of the Martian "Grand Canyon", Valles Marineris.

By the way, the SpaceX Dragon successfully docked with the Space Station this morning.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2014/04/20/spacex-dragon-successfully-docked-with-the-space-station/

Happy Easter!

Today we went back to Merritt Island but this time we went to the National Wildlife Refuge which is the majority of the Island ( the other part being the Kennedy Space Center ). The literature about the Refuge makes the point that the unique relationship the Refuge shares with NASA bears testimony that nature and technology can coexist.

Merritt Island is a 35-mile long barrier island which is strategically located on the Atlantic flyway, a major bird migration corridor, and it is a key resting stop for many migrating bird species. Merritt Island's habitats support one of the highest numbers of endangered and threatened species found within the refuges of the National Wildlife Refuge System.  We began our visit at theVisitor Center where we learned that the Black Point Wildlife Drive, a 7-mile, one-way drive is the best way to see the most diversity in the Refuge. So off we went on the drive that travels through salt and freshwater marshes.

Tricolored Heron

American Bittern?

I'm not much of a bird person, but there was a handy guide booklet that provided some names and pictures.

Between stops #10 and #11 there was the advisory to be on the lookout for Alligators.

First alligator I've seen that wasn't submerged in the water. 

At the conclusion of the Black Point drive we drove over to the Manatee Observation Area. There is a huge Manatee sanctuary that is part of the Refuge. In fact, the literature states that over 50% of the east coast population of Manatees is in the Merritt Island Refuge. We watched 4 of these gentle creatures feeding in the area and I took lots of pictures hoping to get a good one because most of the time the Manatees are feeding off the bottom in very murky water.  Mostly what you see is their humped back and occasionally their noses stick up above the water for air.

Keep looking.  You'll see it after awhile!

When we got back we did the laundry; the first time in 16 days. Then we went back to St. Mary's Church for the East Vigil service, which is my favorite in the whole liturgical calendar. Again, it was a very spiritual experience.

Beautiful sanctuary.

Peter, yesterday we learned that there are three companies that are vying for a chance to build the next rocket that will send a manned (personed?) mission to space. Lockheed?, SpaceX and another company (Souther California something) are the three companies. Perhaps your friend is working on this rocket design for SpaceX.

Happy Easter everyone! I hope you enjoy something chocolate!!