Visiting the capitol of Florida

Before I start, I have to thank Elaine Smith for catching the date goofs from the last blog.  That’s what happens when we do this late. First, Jamestown was founded on May 14, 1607, and the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620. 

 

We have been visiting Florida for about a week and there has never been a day where we did not get rain.  Some days it was all day and some days just a couple of downpours.  To summarize this blog, when it rained we stayed in the motorhome.  We were staying at the Tallahassee Elks Lodge, 6 sites and only 3 of us were parked here.

And when it was mostly clear (2 days) we did the touristy thing.  The first day we decided to see the Gulf of Mexico. We drove south on SR 319 all the way to the beach.  As we drove along SR 319 we were sad to see so many places vacant or for sale.  This was a very depressed area, but a beautiful coastline. 

We stopped for lunch in the little town of Eastpoint, FL, at Capt. Snooks Seafood Restaurant.  This restaurant was owned by the Oyster Company next door. We sat on the patio and watched the little boats unload their gunny sacks of freshly harvested oysters.  Tom ordered 1/2 dozen raw oysters and declared them sweet. tender and delicious.

That was just his appetizer; for an entre his chose scallops.  I had lobster bisque in a bread bowl. It was heavenly.

The architecture is so interesting along the beach; the houses are up on stilts with shutters to protect against the wind and rain.

Beach Houses VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We drove down to the beach and took a short walk  along the sand.  There was some strange pipes and hoses that we could only think it was part of the oil spill cleanup.  The warning of strong rip tides prevented any swimmers this day.

We drove on to Panama City then north on 291 to I-10 and back to Tallahassee when we ran into another gully washer.

Next day.   Our trip to the Capitol was very interesting.  The old Capitol building has been restored to the 1902 version.  When the new capitol building was build it was the intent to tear the old capitol down so the new was built VERY VERY close to the old.  So about half of the building was torn down leaving the 1902 structure. 

There were so many nice displays on the subjects like history, the judicial, the legislature, the mayors, and education.  The special exhibit was on the Girl Scouts celebrating their 100th anniversary.  I was a girl scout and a brownie scout.  The pledge, motto, and uniforms brought back a lot of memories.  Tom and I talked about the benefits of the girl and boy scout programs.

Capitol Displays VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We walked over to the new Capitol and took 2 elevators to the 22 floor for the best views of Tallahassee.

A view from the top VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

This is the view from the back side of the capitol.  The red and white awnings are authentic. There were no color photography back in 1902 but hand painted postcards were found during the restoration and verified the colors.

We left Tallahassee last Thursday and drove to Foley, Alabama.  We were expecting some rain but never thought we would get 6-8 inches in an hour – 14 inches in 24 hours.  That story next blog.  Cache on.