Sunday DAY 8

The shower bottles at this motel were designed for 0.8 of a shower and the body lotion covered a whole leg.

That’s not bad considering some of the places I have stayed in.

The breakfast at the hotel was quite a decent breakfast by motel standards.

The breakfast had several options - waffles, pancakes, eggs, sausage, gravy, bagels, muffins, yogurt,

Breakfast over we were getting ready to go when Sharon pounded on the door to enquire if we needed housekeeping I told her just to empty the bin.

She mentioned three times that tomorrow was her day off. I wasn’t realizing why she was telling me this.

Finally clunk click it dawned, I can be really slow on the up take sometimes.

The Brits have a habit of giving a large tip at the end of their stay rather than daily.

I really didn’t feel like paying her just to empty the bin so I didn’t take her on.

She shouldn’t have knocked, had she waited while we had left and then serviced the room I would have left a couple of dollars.

I went back and grabbed the toothbrushes just in case Sharon had taken the hump with me.

Tomorrows housekeeping would have two days cleaning so they would get the tip.

We made our way down to the bus depot.





After yesterday’s little debacle I got the sense parking is at a bit of a premium in St Augustine but the parking was free at the depot.

The first trolley out was at 9.00pm we got off at St George Street but a lot of the quirky little shops and museums didn’t open until 11.00 am because it was Sunday and we were far too early.

St. George Street was a cute and very busy street. There were loads of stores and restaurants and I actually felt as though I was in Spain.

We looked around the oldest school house.

It is worthy of a visit while you are walking down St. George Street because it was the first school house ever built on the soils of USA.

Strolling by the harbour we noticed they did boat tours and so decided to do it.

It was 11.00am and there was an 11.00am sailing so I asked if they could get us on it. She telephoned the captain and he held the boat for us.

She then went on to presume we were seniors a ten dollar saving.

Was I offended?

To be fair I did look a bit rough that day.

It was really pleasant sitting on the top of the boat the water was calm.

Non- alcoholic cocktails were served by an ultra-polite efficient teenager. Now that’s four words you hardly ever see strung together.

It was 11.00 am on a Sunday. Most teenagers can barely muster the energy required to repeatedly slap the snooze button on a week day morning never mind on a Sunday.

He also had on sensible footwear and wasn’t exposing his underpants.

No stegasaurus hair cut for this kid he sported a very smart flat top.

The captain narrated the whole tour. We have now had two history lessons and feel like we are experts on the history of St Augustine.









Coming back into harbour there was a pod of dolphins, aww it was great to see them in a natural habitat.

I’m sure they were smiling.

I have about fifty photos of the sea because being a senior I have slow hand to eye coordination and I couldn’t capture them when they jumped out of the water.

Josh ever mindful of my senior status helped me down the stairs and off of the boat. I gave him the ten dollars that our fare had been discounted by.

We hopped back on the trolley and got off at stop 16 for the Spanish Military Hospital

I was expecting a tour through the hospital, but we were taken into one room. It was made up with hospital beds of the era. There was a huge display of the instruments used and the tour guide explained all about the hospital. Then you are taken into a second room and the tour guide explained the apothecary. The first demonstration described the most common surgical procedures done back then with the tools used.

It was a bit graphic in the descriptions of amputations and things like that, but all in all a great experience.

The second talked about the herbal remedies the apothecary would use. We learned a lot about apothecaries and their plant discoveries which led to modern medications used today.

We chose well with our choice of museums.

We then realised that we didn’t need to get on the trolley it would be quicker to walk back to George Street.

We were quite hungry so we stopped at a Spanish bakery. We bought several empanadas, a chicken noodle soup plus a Peccadillo soup it was lush and super spicy.

I was placing the order and the baker brought out fresh sausage rolls so I ordered six of those as well.

The empanadas were so fresh and flavourful. The pastry was delicious. We couldn't decide between chicken or beef so we bought three of each. There was a decent outdoor eating area so we had the soup and could only manage one empanada and a sausage roll each.





The sausage rolls look errr interesting.

It started to rain so we got on the bus this was also included in the trolley fare.




It went over the bridge to the beach side of St Augustine.

We were going to get off but it kept on pouring down. We just stayed on the bus and drove all along the coast, I think the driver thought we were nuts he kept announcing the stops and looking at us as though to say are you two never going to get off.

We were the only ones left on it. I was quite happy sitting on the bus watching the raging coastline it beats working.

There was more history and more stops.

It must have dawned on him when I broke out the sausage rolls that we weren’t going anywhere.

We came to the Lighthouse he stopped and observed us munching away on our interesting sausage rolls.

He sighed and said we could get off there or we could just stay on the bus till we got back to where we came from.

I offered him an interesting sausage roll but he declined.

I wasn’t going anywhere in all that rain.

Back on to the trolley we went back to the depot to do The Jail Tour.





Now what really made the attraction worth the price were the tour guides.

They played the part of an inmate, and gave you plenty of history...which although it could be gruesome, it was presented in a light hearted manner.

Out back they had the original hanging station. The jail actually closed in 1953.

It was an interesting view into America's not so pleasant past.


The Warden




The wardens quarters








The women's cell, three to a cell.

Seeing the original graffiti on the cell walls was a little eerie.

They didn’t have any glass or shutters on the windows just bars and all the sewage was chucked out of the window.

Consequently if you were in a cell with no window you had to pour it through the bars into the bucket in the next cell and so on. If you had a grievance with the next cell you could just pour it through on to the beds.

A typical stay was for 3-5 years (for non-death-row inmates).

However, the life expectancy was only 1-2 years (due to the horrible conditions) - and no one ever escaped.

We then went on a tour of the store because it was a freebie added on because we had bought two attractions

It was surprisingly good, a trip back in time and the “in character” storekeepers were excellent. The audience is taken back in time about a hundred years when family owned country stores were a way of life.







After a few moments of grinding corn (Al turned the wheel the wrong way and nearly broke it) and acquiring a piece of penny candy we were treated to the back storage area.

The back had a great museum of old bicycles and washing machines, farm equipment and just about everything needed in rural life way back when.

Everything in the store was the real deal, not a reproduction.

Back to the car we waited thinking the rain would stop but it didn’t.

We were supposed to be going back to Blondies but we would have been ankle deep just getting into the car. There was no way we could walk it in that rain.

We just ate the rest of our empanadas and interesting sausage rolls in the room and watched movies for women.

St Augustine looks lovely, shame about the weather.

Those sure are interesting sausage rolls

Really looks an interesting place to visit .
Funny as always

Looks an interesting day.

What a very informative day. Looks an interesting place

The museums sound great! Really enjoying reading about your trip.