Five -in -One
In my continuing effort to get being outdoors out of my system before the brutal heat and humidity of summer set in, I ventured off to hit 3 State Parks, a State Historic site, an old club - now state park and an old plantation now owned by the National Park Service. The historic site and the old club are on the same property so they count as one stop on this 6-hour long excursion.
Today I started off at the northern most place and really did work my way back south, sometimes going west and then east to do it.
The first stop was Amelia Island State Park. As I was walking from the car to the beach I saw this crab. He was one of several who were out enjoying the muddy flat of the low tide.
Amelia Island State Park is known for 3 things. 1) Fishing on the beach; 2) Looking for shells, which must be hard to do with a lot of people parked on the beach to fish; and 3) You can go horseback riding on the beach. I was not impressed.
Off to the right you can see the main road and behind and below it you can see the old road which is now a large fishing pier. It was a mob scene this morning. People were setting up for a day of fishing off the old bridge.
Next up was stop number 2, Big Talbot Island State Park. There are some walking and mountain biking trails here. This is the pathway that leads to the beach access.
Once you reach the end of the path you can see Amelia Island State Park across the inlet.
The beach is known as the "bone yard" because of all the old, bleached out, dead trees laying across the beach.
To get off the path and down to the beach was a large, like 2-1/2 foot deep step, caused by erosion. I decided not to take the leap and headed back to the car.
Stop 3, Little Talbot Island State Park. Almost all the state parks I have visited have this sign up. This park lives up to the hype. I could insert here something about more of The Real Florida but I think I'll leave that out. There is camping in the woods across the highway which is really nice, I have camped there a couple of times before. There are also nature trails around the camping area. On the east side of A1A there is a large beach which gets mobbed during the warmer months.
I parked and hiked down to the beach for a stroll. There is supposed to be some good sea shells to be found here. My first sight was this Laughing Gull. There are numerous signs up that seabirds are nesting along the shore so I gave it a wide birth.
Further down the beach was this chunk of an old boat.
Even further down was this Horseshoe crab. I am pretty sure it was dead as it never moved when the waves washed over it and turned it around.
After a long 30 minute walk I headed back to the car and noticed the smoke from the West Mimms fire in Georgia.
We're now at stop number 4 which is a dual stop. On one side of the road there is a historic marker talking about the Mission of San Juan Del Puerto.
It continues on the other side.
Across the 1-1/2 lane road is the Ribault Club, it first opened in 1928 as a recreational club with 14 bedroom, a library, fireplace and lots of activities including lawn bowling, tennis, sailing and golfing on a Scottish style 9-hole course. By 1930 an additional lodge was built to help accommodate the 350 affluent members. Now the State owns it and you can rent rooms out for private events.
While walking around the inside of the club and the grounds I kept hearing a peacock crying. I finally found him as he headed over to the downspout looking for bugs.
Heading to the last stop I passed St. George Episcopal Church. The church was built during 1882-1883 and opened for services in 1884. In 2002 it was placed on the National Registry of Historic Places. It is still used for Sunday service today.
We are now heading to the plantation. The road in is 1-1/2 miles of dirt, lots of dust and occasional pot holes which are hard to see because of the dappling on the road from the shade of the trees. I was really glad I did not get my car washed the day before this excursion.
Back in the days when this was an operating plantation both sides of the road would have been fields of Indigo and Sea Island Cotton what would have been worked by slaves.
The first place to stop once you pass through the park gates is the slave quarters, or rather what is left of them. Each building had one door and one window plus a fireplace for cooking. It had to have gotten pretty hot in these buildings during the summers.
I couldn't get all of the slave homes in one photo, there are about 20-25 of them and during its peak the plantation had between 60-80 slaves of all ages.
To get to the main house you go further down the road. Back when this was an working plantation, this was a field of crops not trees and you could see the plantation house clearly. The plantation ceased functioning around 1900.
What makes Kingsley Plantation interesting is that the owner's wife was purchased as a slave in Havana, Cuba. He later freed her and she became her husband's business partner.
This is the back of the house, the front side faces the river where the boats would bring supplies, visitors and load the cotton for shipping to other ports. The house dates back to 1798 and is the oldest plantation house still standing in Florida. The building whose end faces you is the kitchen and also housed the misstress' office.
Like all self-sufficient places this one had a good size barn. The left hand side was built first and later the right side was added.
The front of the house facing the river. It had several windows which could be opened to catch the sea breezes to help cool the house. If you look hard you can see the Widow's walk where Zephaniah Kingsley would stand and watch his slaves work.
Each slave was given 1/4 acre to tend to every day. In the right middle of the photo is one marker, in the back right corner, another marker and in the back left a 3rd marker. These are 3 of the 4 corners of a 1/4 acre lot.
It is an interesting place to visit but also sobering when you think of how the slaves lived.
Today I started off at the northern most place and really did work my way back south, sometimes going west and then east to do it.
The first stop was Amelia Island State Park. As I was walking from the car to the beach I saw this crab. He was one of several who were out enjoying the muddy flat of the low tide.
Amelia Island State Park is known for 3 things. 1) Fishing on the beach; 2) Looking for shells, which must be hard to do with a lot of people parked on the beach to fish; and 3) You can go horseback riding on the beach. I was not impressed.
Off to the right you can see the main road and behind and below it you can see the old road which is now a large fishing pier. It was a mob scene this morning. People were setting up for a day of fishing off the old bridge.
Next up was stop number 2, Big Talbot Island State Park. There are some walking and mountain biking trails here. This is the pathway that leads to the beach access.
Once you reach the end of the path you can see Amelia Island State Park across the inlet.
The beach is known as the "bone yard" because of all the old, bleached out, dead trees laying across the beach.
To get off the path and down to the beach was a large, like 2-1/2 foot deep step, caused by erosion. I decided not to take the leap and headed back to the car.
Stop 3, Little Talbot Island State Park. Almost all the state parks I have visited have this sign up. This park lives up to the hype. I could insert here something about more of The Real Florida but I think I'll leave that out. There is camping in the woods across the highway which is really nice, I have camped there a couple of times before. There are also nature trails around the camping area. On the east side of A1A there is a large beach which gets mobbed during the warmer months.
I parked and hiked down to the beach for a stroll. There is supposed to be some good sea shells to be found here. My first sight was this Laughing Gull. There are numerous signs up that seabirds are nesting along the shore so I gave it a wide birth.
Further down the beach was this chunk of an old boat.
Even further down was this Horseshoe crab. I am pretty sure it was dead as it never moved when the waves washed over it and turned it around.
After a long 30 minute walk I headed back to the car and noticed the smoke from the West Mimms fire in Georgia.
We're now at stop number 4 which is a dual stop. On one side of the road there is a historic marker talking about the Mission of San Juan Del Puerto.
It continues on the other side.
Across the 1-1/2 lane road is the Ribault Club, it first opened in 1928 as a recreational club with 14 bedroom, a library, fireplace and lots of activities including lawn bowling, tennis, sailing and golfing on a Scottish style 9-hole course. By 1930 an additional lodge was built to help accommodate the 350 affluent members. Now the State owns it and you can rent rooms out for private events.
While walking around the inside of the club and the grounds I kept hearing a peacock crying. I finally found him as he headed over to the downspout looking for bugs.
Heading to the last stop I passed St. George Episcopal Church. The church was built during 1882-1883 and opened for services in 1884. In 2002 it was placed on the National Registry of Historic Places. It is still used for Sunday service today.
We are now heading to the plantation. The road in is 1-1/2 miles of dirt, lots of dust and occasional pot holes which are hard to see because of the dappling on the road from the shade of the trees. I was really glad I did not get my car washed the day before this excursion.
Back in the days when this was an operating plantation both sides of the road would have been fields of Indigo and Sea Island Cotton what would have been worked by slaves.
The first place to stop once you pass through the park gates is the slave quarters, or rather what is left of them. Each building had one door and one window plus a fireplace for cooking. It had to have gotten pretty hot in these buildings during the summers.
I couldn't get all of the slave homes in one photo, there are about 20-25 of them and during its peak the plantation had between 60-80 slaves of all ages.
To get to the main house you go further down the road. Back when this was an working plantation, this was a field of crops not trees and you could see the plantation house clearly. The plantation ceased functioning around 1900.
What makes Kingsley Plantation interesting is that the owner's wife was purchased as a slave in Havana, Cuba. He later freed her and she became her husband's business partner.
This is the back of the house, the front side faces the river where the boats would bring supplies, visitors and load the cotton for shipping to other ports. The house dates back to 1798 and is the oldest plantation house still standing in Florida. The building whose end faces you is the kitchen and also housed the misstress' office.
Like all self-sufficient places this one had a good size barn. The left hand side was built first and later the right side was added.
The front of the house facing the river. It had several windows which could be opened to catch the sea breezes to help cool the house. If you look hard you can see the Widow's walk where Zephaniah Kingsley would stand and watch his slaves work.
Each slave was given 1/4 acre to tend to every day. In the right middle of the photo is one marker, in the back right corner, another marker and in the back left a 3rd marker. These are 3 of the 4 corners of a 1/4 acre lot.
It is an interesting place to visit but also sobering when you think of how the slaves lived.
I have visited the Kingsley Plantation and was very unaware of how hard a crop like indigo was on the slaves. They didn't live long after working with it.
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