On February 10^th, 2006, Heather and I went up to St. Augustine for the weekend, taking a needed vacation and celebrating our first Valentine's day in style. We stayed at a bed and breakfast call 44 Spanish Street. We left about mid-day that Friday, and arrived around 4pm.

Day 1

Apparently all the little B&Bs name their rooms, and we stayed in the Palm South room. Here's Heather in our room:

The dominating feature of this room was the giant jacuzzi tub in the corner, which you can see behind Heather above. The room was a little on the small side, and we both found it odd to shower in the jacuzzi tub, because it feels like you're showering right in the bedroom. This is because you're showering right in the bedroom.

The hotel was right in the middle of town, and we were able to walk pretty much everywhere. The first night we had some of the most delicious pizza in the world at a place right next to our hotel, and had a great beer called "Great White". After that we walked down to Ripley's Believe It or Not!, which was nice and bizarre. You could tell the place was getting on in its years, as some of the exhibits were busted, and most of the other stuff had a lot of wear and tear. There was still some cool stuff, though:

Day 2

The next day we hit up the fort, and Heather played photographer, taking some really nice shots. It was windy and chilly, but not cold, and it was very relaxing to walk about the ruins, people watching and reading the aging informational signs. Heather took a lot of cool pictures, like this turret:

This was the barracks:

Training the new guy:

A decrepit old something:

And finally, us on the wall:

We spent the rest of the day wandering around, looking at cool stuff, eating good things, drinking good wine, and buying stuff. I got a gargoyle to put on my monitor, a cool green ring for Heather, and some other stuff. We walked away from the touristy section, getting into some of the surrounding area. This turned into somewhat of a death march, as we walked away from everything until we got tired, and then had to walk back. We walked way up to the Sebastion winery, where we sampled a variety of wines, and walked away with 2 bottles of a sweet fruity wine and one of port. We slowly made our way back, taking pictures of Flagler college on the way:

And this statue looks exactly Heather's dad, except shorter and a little more religious.

That night we ate at a crappy sports bar because everything nice needed reservations, and then went bar hopping, ending up at a locals bar watching the Neskimos play nintendo music interspersed with crappy 80s songs. We were kinda tired after the march, but luckily we got to the bar in time to snag a couple of comfy chairs, so the hour wait through the mediocre cover bands wasn't too bad. The place was set up more like a house party, with couches and recliners all over the place. It was pretty neat. Heather thought it was funny that we came to St. Augustine to do the equivelant of what we'd be doing in Gainesville.

Day 3

The next morning we ate breakfast with our hotel-mates and then checked out. Those were always a little awkward because we were the youngest ones there, with others talking about leaving their teenages home alone, and flying across the country to get here. We mostly stayed out of the small talk, just soaking in the differences and hoping they all could see one of Heather's tattoos. We packed our bags and drove out, stopping at little places that looked interesting and generally taking our time getting back to town. We drove over to the beach, and played a round of mini-golf on a deserted course a few miles out of town. A cold front had come through, and it was probably around 50 degrees and windy. Unlike yesterday, this was cold. This resulted in numb hands for us and an adorably shivering duck:

After we conquered the 18 holes of grueling terrain, we wandered over to the pier, and walked out to have a look at the ocean and watch some teenager scare birds. Heather took a nice shot of the ocean:

And I found the cliffs of insanity picture-worthy:

After that we decided it was too cold to be outside anymore, and had some really good seafood at a place claiming to be the best seafood in whatever little town we were in. I haven't made a comprehensive study, but I'll give it to them for now. Then, we made the trek home, and went to work.

Overall, it was a very nice little vacation, and we're thinking about trying to make it a yearly thing, which I would certainly enjoy. The unannotated gallery generated by Picasa (including some bad night shots) is up on Heather's site: StAugustine_Feb06.