[Travel, Florida] St. Augustine

The Southern HQ in Savannah is proving to be a great spot to start weekender exploration along the Atlantic coast.  As you know, I've spent many a short trip in Hilton Head, which is barely over an hour away.  Last month's run down to Palm Springs was quite doable.  Charleston and even Myrtle Beach are easy striking distance.  This time it was a dead simple sub-3-hour drive to St. Augustine.

In many ways, St. Augustine reminds me of Savannah or Charleston.  It is a city that has embraced its storied history as essential to its appeal to visitors and is deeply dedicated to its preservation.  In the case of Savannah and Charleston that history is of the old South.  In the case of St. A, it's that of conquistadors and pirates.

Juan Ponce De Leon was the first European to explore the area.  Fun fact about De Leon:  He was serving as Governor of Puerto Rico when Columbus used his influence with the Spanish monarchs to replace him with one of old Chirstopher's relative.  That's what prompted him to head north and explore Florida.   Also, he was a wee man.  Under five feet tall. There is a statue of him in the center of St. Augustine and people comment that it seems small.  Those in the know inform them that it is actual size. Ho, ho, ho. Juan P de L also explored up the Gulf coast, getting as far north Ft. Myers and Manasota.  St. A was officially founded in 1565 (decades after Ponce de Leon) in the name of Spain, making it the oldest city in the U.S.  What followed was pirates, British takeover,  Spanish re-takeover, then eventually U.S. takeover.  

Also like Charleston and Savannah there is a sizable pedestrian old town area where the history intermixes with bars and restaurants and quirky shops and arts venues.  There is a smallish college wedged firmly into the historic community in all three locales (College of Charleston, Savannah College of Art and Design, Flagler College) and a broadly youthful local base.  And B&Bs everywhere.

Some quick notes:

• Strong recommendation for the Centennial House B&B, and I don't usually like B&Bs, but the breakfast was tasty, the room comfy, and lots of free hooch.  I would definitely stay there again.

• There is a place called The Bath Junkie, which is a bath soaps and amenities shop which connects to The Tipsy Duck, a bubble bath themed bar.  It is immensely cool.  Visit it.

• Be sure to visit the St. Augustine Distillery for a Bourbon tour.  And the Winery for some more free hooch.

• Most places that claim to be artist communities are just a bunch of pretentious retirees doing crafts. St. A is much more legit.  Visit the galleries.

Regrets, I have a few.  We took a Taste of St. Augustine walking tour and while the tour itself was fine, the food was awful.  Oh well, but the real regret is we never got to St. Augustine beach.  St. Augustine is on the mainland, just off the coast is a barrier island called Anastasia where the (separate) community of St. Augustine Beach is.  Renowned for sit-by-the-water fish restaurants and, of course, the beach.  It was a bit chilly for a beach day. Next time for sure.

Rather than hit I-95 immediately, on the way back we took A1A along the coast, through Ponta Verda, as far north as Jacksonville.  Beautiful drive. Beautiful beaches and not very crowded.  It almost made me want to consider the ocean side for my retirement.  Almost.  As beautiful as it was, I'm a gulf coastal dude.  That aside, I'm really enjoying these Atlantic Coast road trips.  I hope there are more in my future.

[Travel, Florida] Ave Anna Maria

Every time I stay in a Florida Gulf beach town I think to myself, "Yeah, I could live here..." Anna Maria is no exception. But we start with an interesting AirBnB.

Normally, a trip to the Gulf means renting a room in a small beachside hotel. But as it turned out, for less than the price of a serviceable hotel room, I could get an entire house on AirBnB. Essentially I got a two bedroom/two bath home (part of a duplex), a five minute walk from the beach on the north end of Anna Maria, just around the corner from a string of shops and restaurants. Five star ratings from previous renters. All for about 70% of the price of a wee hotel room. I went for it.

This was not my first AirBnB. I rented one for my Idaho/Eclipse trip back in August, but that was managed by a rental house agency. This house was one of what I guess to be a set of three, owned by a guy and his two sisters. I think they list them all on AirBnB and just move around to stay whichever one isn't occupied for any given time. In any event, I met the fellow at his house -- nice, good natured guy -- he showed me around briefly and was about to be on his way when I asked, "What about keys?"

"Oh, I lost them a while back. Just leave the door unlocked. There's no crime here and the guy who lives downstairs is ex-Marine special ops."

Alrighty.

So I wasn't really sure what I was getting into here. A part of me felt like I was a character in an Elmore Leonard novel, about to find myself entangled with highly colorful kooks in some sort of shenanigans. But realistically, I had nothing all that valuable. Visits to Florida generally involve two pairs of cargo shorts, a couple of ratty old t-shirts, bathing suit, sandals, and sunglasses. My laptop wouldn't get me $50 on Craigslist, and its contents are backed-up. My phone is always with me, and I could lock the door from the inside so personal safety wasn't an issue. The former special ops Marine turned out to be a touch over 60 with a startup that was about to go Series A. So, yeah.

And it was fine. I never saw either the owner or the special ops guy again. I gave them 5 stars and they gave me five stars so my AirBnB cred is now perfect. And I gained a genuine affection for Anna Maria Island.

To get to Anna Maria Island from Sarasota you can do a lovely hour-plus drive at about 25 mph up through longboat key, or you can drive through the next city north, Bradenton, and save about half the time. Since I have driven the keys more times than I can count, I chose the short route.

Bradenton is downscale from Sarasota -- filed with weatherbeaten old strip malls and chain restaurants. It's not the best place to live in Florida but it may be one of the cheapest. There are a couple of areas in town that are coming along -- a historic downtown area that has some old, character-full buildings and commercial activity, like one those officially designated revitalization zones you see in struggling cities, and as you move west toward the water there a lot of nice looking gentrified gated communities for snowbirds and such. For the most part though, Bradenton is on the low end. They have a problem with opiates and crime/gangs associated with them, like every other working class city, although not so bad as to make it unliveable.

In my travels I have seen a large number of places like this. Cities that end up as the functional back rooms for primarily tourist enclaves. The people here constitute the underclass of the service industry. What, in less abiding times, we would have called menial labor. They wash dishes and bus tables, clean the grounds and the rooms, work the convenience store counters and souvenir shops, wash cars, haul trash. They have no job security and no growth opportunity but, as long as the tourists and retirees keep coming, they can generally stay employed with a couple of part-time jobs at a buck or two over minimum wage.

Cross the bridge from Bradenton to Anna Maria Island and things are different, of course. That said, Anna Maria isn't the tightly controlled environment of say a Sanibel or Boca Grande. It doesn't cost anything to get on the island and it's easily accessible to many Gulf-area cities so the tone of Anna Maria is somewhat different from the truly high end places. More commoners -- proles, if you will -- hit the island, so right at the point of crossing there is an ugly shopping center area right near the largest public beach, Holmes Beach, which like the whole island has that perfect baby powder sand that the Gulf is famous for. The beach is lovely, but on the the immediate area surrounding it is generically commercial and as such, an inexpensive area. That is to say, it fits the likely clientele.

Not surprisingly, as you move away from this area, either north or south on the key, things get more hoity-toity as the upstairs cushions itself from the downstairs. My AirBnB was in the farthest north neighborhood, entirely residential, just past a string of tastefully done shops and restaurants.

I know I sound awfully snooty as I write all this. I don't mean to. The proles who visit seem just as happy as the petty bourgeois in the upscale areas. I'm sure they are. But to pretend there are not clear class distinctions in some of these places is to ignore the obvious. Also to deny that I prefer luxury and exclusivity in my vacation locales is to ignore myself.

It startlingly easy to fall into an island rhythm. The house I was in was delightfully shaded, so it never got too hot and I didn't turn on the a/c, just had the windows open and breeze going 24 hours a day. Wake up mid-morning, slip on a pair of shorts, t-shirt, and sandals then walk down the street for something to eat. Or don my running shoes and go for a beach run. Come back, change into bathing suit for a swim in the Gulf. In the evening walk down to a restaurant on the pier on the sound side for the fresh catch, or a beach bar for some peel 'n' eats and a beer and watch the sunset.

I've been coming to this area for over 20 years and I've seen and done most everything touristy around the area, so the only significant excursion was to Mykella State Park, an interesting stretch of swampy wilderness -- plenty of wildlife and history (including gators, of course). A fine low-key day trip. But in truth, there is little new in these parts for me to see.

All Good Things... I returned north on Christmas day to record cold and had to get up the following day to run the snow-blower so I could get out of my garage. I love Michigan, I love the area where I live, but really need to be snow-bird. Bug out after Thanksgiving and not return until April. That would be perfect. Now I'm thinking of buying a place and just letting AirBnB rent it out when I'm up north. I'd make sure I had keys as special ops Marines are in short supply.