Forts, Gardens and Food

Gamble Rodgers SRA, Flagler Beach, FL - Site #29

The rain has stopped, but the fog rolled in this morning. It was fairly warm compared to recent days (and certainly compared to Massachusetts). We even had some sun today. Fun, too!

We decided that since the weather was improving and we had weekend reservations at Manatee Hammock, our next planned campground, we would try to stay here for three more nights, if our current site was still available. Weekend campground spots are nearly impossible to find on short notice during the winter months. And a short online perusal of some alternate campgrounds after Manatee Hammock showed nothing available. While we had not considered this as a long term stay, here we are. The campsite is a little short for Speedy with the bike rack, but we fit. The beach is right next to us and there seem to be a fair number of nature trails and reserves nearby.

Since we are staying here for four nights, we decided to do some touring today. But first a little laundry. There were still a few wet clothes from yesterday. We now have one 25¢ piece left. As the washing was happening, we planned the day. Our first destination was Fort Matanzas National Monument, about 15 miles to the north. Then we would stop at Washington Oaks Gardens State Park on the way back.

We arrived at Fort Matanzas at 11:31, just a minute after the ferry out to the fort departed, leaving us two hours to kill. Fort Matanzas NM is relatively small with "mainland" area running from the Atlantic, across A1A to the Matanzas River. And an island area on Rattlesnake Island, where Fort Matanzas is situated. You can only visit the fort on the scheduled ferry tours. They run every hour on the half-hour...except 12:30pm.  It was almost lunch time anyway, so lunch we did.

After lunch we walked the very quiet nature trial. If there were many birds, they were taking their after lunch siesta (which we probably should have done. At 1:30 we headed off to the island. Fort Matanzas overlooks the Matanzas Inlet connecting the river to the sea. If you sail north along the river, you reach St. Augustine. It is effectively the backdoor to the city. The Spanish found this out when a French force attempted to attack St. Augustine, got blown too far south by a hurricane and wrecked near Daytona. These were found by the Spanish, who tipped off by the natives, holed up at Matanzas Inlet.

It wasn't always called the Matanzas Inlet and the Matanzas River, but after the Spanish massacred (matnazas) the French who had surrenders, it took on the name.

While St. Augustine was well defended by its own fort facing the Atlantic, it had this undefended back entrance and a British threat, so they built a small fort within cannon range of the entrance to the inlet. It served it purpose by repelling several incursions by the British. The Fort was manned from 1740 continuously until 1921, when the US acquired Florida from Spain. It was then abandoned and left to molder until 1924 when Calvin Coolidge declared it a National Monument under the Antiquities Act and the government started to restore it. The restoration lasted through the 1930's when it was turned over by the War Department to the National Park Service (It became a WPA project then).

It is interesting that it was still officially a military property until then, even though it had been abandoned.

Now we get to see the fort almost as it existed during the first Spanish period. It even has a couple of the original cannons. It is actually quite small when you think of a fort and was manned by less than a dozen soldiers and an officer. It has an elevated gun deck with the soldiers' quarters (a single room) behind it. Above the soldier's quarters was the officer's room which is the same size as that for all the soldiers. On the top was the observation deck with unobstructed views to the head of the inlet and the ocean.




 It was an interesting visit to the fort although we weren't able to explore the island, which is also a bird sanctuary. Since it is named Rattlesnake Island, that is probably a good call. We did spot a Bald Eagle from the fort and a dolphin swan right past the ferry as we were boarding to leave.

As we were returning to the mainland, we spied a grove of trees full of birds near the visitor center. When we were back on land we walked towards the area to try and spot them. We did...and found a roost of almost all of the wading birds, White Herons, Snowy and Tri-colored Egrets, Wood Stork, White Ibis and Black-crowned Night Herons (and a few Brown Pelicans as well). There was also an Osprey in a tree further away.

From the fort we headed south towards camp and stopped at a small state park called Washinton Oaks Gardens. This is land, which also runs from the ocean to the Matanzas River, originally a Spanish grant, then owned by a relative of George Washington (also named George Washinton) who married into the Spanish family and finally purchased at a bargain price in the 1930's by Owen Young, founder and Chairman of RCA and then Chairman of General Electric, as a wedding gift for his second wife, Louise. She left it to the state as a park.

They built a small home in an oak grove overlooking the river and its marshes and also created a cirtus grove and a charming formal garden on the property. The gardens originally fronted on A1A and there are stories of Owen Young picking a few crates of oranges and sitting by the road selling them to passers-by. He must have tired of this because he eventually got the state to re-route A1A further to the east so it no longer went past his front gate.

The house, now the park's visitor center, was a pleasant surprise. It is not a mansion, by only a small two bedroom, two bath home with a living room, dining rooms and kitchen. It is not much bigger than our home. As we wandered around, there were several other buildings including the caretaker's home, which almost seemed larger than the main house.

The garden was also not overwhelmingly large, with a rose garden, a winding set of interconnected reflecting pools, complete with giant carp and catfish...and, according to Ellen, a swimming snake. It bordered the citrus grove. From there we saw our first Pileated Woodpecker of the year.

We also had a very accommodating Palm Warbler who hopped along a wall in the rose garden.


After our garden tour, we drove back to camp and researched dinner options. It was a birthday dinner for me, so we celebrated with some good seafood at the Flagler Fish Company, a combination fish market and restaurant, sort of like the old Legal Seafoods, before they got fancy and became a chain.

As we parked Speedy, we knew we were safe as this vehicle was parked next to us.

When we sat down they brought a big bowl of home-made crispy russet potato chips, It was hard to resist eating too many.

I started with a cup of fish chowda. Although the waitress could tell us what seafood was in it, it was pretty tasty—creamy with lots of fish and one oversized potato chunk. Since we didn't know exactly what was in it, Ellen reluctantly didn't try it.

Ellen had a tasty tuna burger with wasabe sauce with a glass of "Kickass Shiraz" and I had grilled local Sheepshead, a buck-toothed fish with almost more head than body, but with a firm white flesh accompanied by asiago potatoes and grilled mushrooms and onions with gorgonzola. 

(When we were at Gulf Islands National Seashore with our friends the Chisholms and the Fishers, they were hauling in Sheepshead by the dozens at the fishing pier. Harry & Tom caught a bunch for us. They had a heck of a time filleting them.)

We finished up with a individual sized rum cake with pecans and whipped cream. A tasty birthday cake.

Sorry—no food photos.