Anastasia Island

Our stay at the Day’s Inn at St. Augustine was fine. The room was clean and quiet, which satisfies our main criteria for vacation lodging. We did our morning German lessons, showered and met the Whittingtons for breakfast. We walked to the McDonalds a block from the Day’s Inn and had biscuit breakfasts then walked around St. Augustine’s old town. We especially enjoyed the area around the Fountain of Youth Park with the coquina walls made from compacted coral, mollusk shells and sand. Coquina is a young limestone that is used in many buildings in the St. Augustine area. We went by a couple of coffee shops so Cindy could get her caffeine fix as we walked.

St. Augustine Alligator Farm

After our walk, we checked out of the Day’s Inn and drove to the Anastasia Island where we visited the St. Augustine Alligator Farm. We were pleased that our Cincinnati Zoo membership card got half price admission for all four of us. We saw every imaginable species of alligator, crocodile, gavial, and caiman. There is a large pond filled with American alligators of all size. Twice a day, at noon and three pm, they put on a show when the alligators in this pond are fed.

Galapagos Tortoise 

The feature attraction is Maximo, a 13’ 9” saltwater crocodile, and his mate. Maximo’s predecessor, Gomek, was one of the largest crocodiles ever in captivity and was over 15 feet in length. A full-sized replica of Gomek is in a display building. In addition to crocodilians, there was a variety of birds, mammals, snakes, and lizards at the St. Augustine Alligator Farm.

After leaving the alligator farm, we drove south of Highway A1A to Anastasia State Park which is a beautiful beach on the island. We spent a good bit of time walking along the beach, trying to identify the gulls and other shore birds. It was a beautiful day, and we enjoyed our walk.

We continued our drive south on Anastasia Island to Fort Matanzas National Monument. Along the way we snacked on the Aldi Tuscan trail mix and candied nuts that we brought. At the park, we went to the visitor center and attempted to get a ferry pass to the fort on a smaller nearby island. The earliest we could get on a ferry was a 90-minute wait, so we decided to skip the fort for this visit. When we were here last, the ferry wasn’t running because storms had damaged the docks. We hope to be able to ride over to the fort on our next visit.

Fort Matanzas

After exploring the Matanzas River, we started driving back to Homosassa, arriving a little after 6 pm. The dogs were happy to see us returning. We had a leftovers meal of grouper tacos, asparagus, chips and crab dip. After dinner we walked the dogs, watched an episode of Monsieur Spade on Acorn TV then turned in.