Today's daytrip was to the
Jacksonville area where we intended to do a lighthouse tour.
The first stop was Amelia Island, where we meandered around lost for awhile until we finally found the small drive to the lighthouse. Unfortunately, the street passed through private property before ending on Coast Guard property and a "No Trespassing" sign. The lighthouse was visible, but with only a very limited viewing space due to the restrictions. Not a very good start for the day, however being the eternal optimists, we persisted.
With rain clouds further dampening our
spirits, we traveled on to Fernando Beach, then down
A1A toward Jacksonville Beach.
Along the way we decided it was time to enjoy our picnic lunch, so we began to look for a suitable place to stop. The first two attempts proved to be less than scenic, so we moved on down the A1A.
Then noticing a turnoff to a small park near the George Crady Bridge, with rain pelting the windshield, we found the perfect place to sit and eat in our vehicle. At first, the parking area seemed to be just the typical parking lot with dunes hiding the beach. Then we noticed a small sign that read "4 x 4 vehicles only". That's Us ! We drove right up to the beach and had our picnic within a few feet of the water. That's when we noticed the tracks. "We can drive the Jeep on the beach here !!"
After hurrying through lunch we took
off. Here is a short video of our drive.
Back on the hard road again, we
traveled on down towards Jacksonville Beach. We had to use a ferry
to cross a small gap in the island, but even that was unexpected and
fun. 
Just on the other side, after several wrong turns, we found the St John's River Lighthouse, which we had to view through a chain link fence. This was not to be our best lighthouse tour. We did manage to get a few photos through the fence.
A little further down the A1A we
happened upon an intriguing castle hidden in the trees.
Just north of Jacksonville Beach we found an almost deserted stretch of beach and while we were there stretching our legs we were blessed to be able to watch the fog roll in. (Seems I remember a scary movie about fog rolling in. ??)
Before we knew it we were again in familiar territory, coming into St Augustine. By then it was getting near sunset, so we slowed down and watched for deer on the way back to our base camp.
As is so often the case, our day did
not go as planned, but turned out much better than we could have
imagined.
(back to) RVing LTD blog
No comments:
Post a Comment