Day 22 April 14 Auburn and Montgomery, AL

Good morning!
Campsite cardinal.
Let's go for a hike!
Brown frog and spotted frog

Juju and Maya's garbage collection from the hike.
Drove to Montgomery to go to the Civil Rights Memorial Center. (www.civilrightsmemorialcenter.org)
The exhibits were very moving, and very intense. J and M absorbed some of it, and had lots of questions, which we talked about. Here they are at the memorial itself – very beautiful. The memorial is a circular black granite table with water coming up the middle and running in a very thin, even flow off the sides. It lists the martyrs and chronicles the history of the movement in lines that radiate from the middle. The designer left a space in between the start and finish of the timeline to honor the struggles that occurred before and that are still going on.
The other part of the memorial has MLK's quote: (We will not be satisfied) ...until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
At the close of the exhibits, there was a wall of tolerance. If you were ready to take a stand against injustice, you were asked to enter your name on the computer of sorts, at which point your named joined the (thousands?) of others that moved down the theatre-sized screen in different sizes and colors.
On our way to visit the Capitol (Juju is doing her state report on Alabama) we stopped by a house where MLK lived.

Montgomery felt so southern and I can't put my finger on why, Maybe it's all the columns on the buildings – from the antebellum era?
At the Capitol, we met Aroine Irby, a man who walked in the Selma-to-Montgomery Voting Rights March. He told us that Gov. Wallace wouldn't let any of the protesters set foot on the Capitol so that the March wouldn't have to be commemorated anywhere on the property. He also told us that he believed George Wallace truly had a change of heart after he was shot and paralyzed and that when he ran for governor again he won 98% of the black vote. His co-workers weren't so sure – they believed he just knew how to play it.
Maya loved the azaleas at the Capitol.
On the way to Mississippi we took the quiet highway through Selma, and stopped at the Edmund Pettus bridge, where the Selma-Montgomery march started. J and M were able to see how long of a march it was since we drove the route backwards - 57 miles.

Day 21, April 13 Getting Doug up to Atlanta, Auburn AL

On our way up to Atlanta, we HAD to stop by what was touted as “The World's Largest Tack Store”. It was absolutely huge, and Juju and Maya posed in their favorite departments.

Then we headed up to Decatur, a city east of Atlanta where we looked for “The Raging Burrito” restaurant. In the Bahia Honda campground, Doug saw a car with the restaurant's web site on it and we asked about it. The guy said it was his brother-in-law's place and that Decatur was pretty close to where we needed to go. We found it, and enjoyed some yummy burritos and met the aforementioned brother-in-law.
Mona Lisa is happy with her margarita

Walking around Decatur Square
We dropped Doug off with sad goodbyes but happy that he came and joined us for the fun. We left the airport and headed toward Auburn, AL. We pitched a tent in Chewacla State Park.
Pretty lake
This campground has a great play area with the fun, metal structures!

Juju and Maya enjoyed the fast slide
Campfire! We hadn't been able to have a campfire yet-there weren't many campfire pits where we traveled. Maya and Juju made a great little fire!

Days 18, 19 - April 11,12 - Oldest City in U.S., St. Augustin, FL

On the way out from the Keys we spent one last night at Annette's. We also had to pick up all the luggage we had left behind so that Doug and his stuff could fit in. Doug, with his amazing talent for packing, managed to get everything in with just inches to spare.
Had to take a picture of this -- Juju sprawled on the bed and Maya sleeping with her feet on the floor and head under the blanket. Poor baby!
We headed up to St. Augustine to be total tourists and see the nation's oldest city. But first, set up camp in St. Augustine beach. Really great campground with lots of trees and birds, and we even had a butterfly flutter onto a branch over our tent to stay for a while.
St. Augustine Beach is really pretty. More wild than the southern FL beaches. Only negative is that cars can drive on the beach, but we saw only one set of tire tracks. We ran around the beach at sunset - no bugs! Yay!

Drove into town to check it out a bit...
Breakfast
and then time for some hiking. Doug found this fishing device (?) next to a little fishing pond. Looks like you use it like a treadmill or something so that you can reel 'em in.
We walked out on a dock to check out the pond and I asked J and M to be quiet so that we could see some wildlife. Too late, Maya had stomped around, but it turned out to be a good thing because about 40 turtles started cruising toward us to get something to eat.
We all loved the Spanish moss. Juju and Maya took some handfuls to have in the car - it's so soft and cushy. There was a big industry around spanish moss a while back when it was used for stuffing mattresses, pillows, etc. Uber-eco!

Maya's photo of some of the wild azalea - she loved those.
Right near the state park's entrance was a short trail leading to an old coquina quarry. Pretty interesting stuff! It was used for a lot of the building around St. Augustine and was great for the fortress there because cannon balls would actually just mush into the walls and not cause any damage.
J and Doug in the old quarry. There is still a huge amount of intact and crushed shells mixed in the dirt there. Maya found a few good ones she liked.

Time to do the touristy thing and see all the sights in St. Augustine. First was the Castillo de San Marcos, the fortress built by the Spaniards to protect St. Augustine, and probably the closest things the U.S. has to a castle in terms of size and age. The Spaniards went above and beyond the architecture of castles to create a fortress that was never taken over by force. Juju and Maya were impressed by how the soldiers lived, and how the cannons and cannonballs worked.


Standing inside an area where the walls were 17 feet thick - ammunition was stored here.

Once again, the history we read about was filled with stories about how badly the Native Americans were treated; in this case, the Seminole people. Though very fond of the 20$ bill, Maya wasn't so sure how she felt about Andrew Jackson anymore.
Standing in front of the oldest house in the U.S.

Looked around Lincolnville, a section of St. Augustine that had all kinds of interesting and beautiful houses, as well as the oldest carriage house in the U.S., horses and barns included. Lincolnville was the second settlement in the US of emancipated slaves.

The Ponce de Leon Fountain of Youth archaeological site was a bit of a tourist trap, so we talked a bit about how he came to the St. Augustine area in 1513 while looking for a source of water rumored to be magical and how he named the region Pascua de florida - feast of the flowers.
One of those coquina walls I like
and a pretty tree-with-spanish-moss lined street.
Tomorrow Doug flies home...

Days 16,17 - April 9,10 Bahia Honda Key, FL

Another great tent site with a wonderful view.

Wonderful, warm water. We swam and swam, but Juju and Maya had time to pose with their Martha Washington water hairdos.
Martha close-up.
We got Doug a du-rag from a truck stop in Louisiana ($2.49 - super cheap for that good look) and he posed at the pizza shop.

Second night of camping we were next to a very animated group had arrived - the last straw was when, at 7AM, the abuela shouted "arriba arriba" to her family to rustle them out of bed. We all were less than happy with that wake up call.
On our second day there we decided to stay all day on the Atlantic side. Less people, more wildlife. What luck! Juju, Maya and I were standing in the water and got to see a manta ray jump out of the water about 100 feet from us. Beautiful!
I spotted a little island a ways out and wanted to go out to it - Doug suggested we take a kayak while he lounged on the beach. I got the kayak and Doug decided it looked like too much fun so he climbed in with the girls and I swam. There were loads of conch and some bahama sea stars on the sea floor, and at one point I dove down and came up with a large, beautiful shell (not a conch - those are illegal to take)to bring home.
There's the island behind J and M. They were great at kayaking when they did it on their own for practice.
At the little island, Maya found a sea sponge treasure. She wanted to take it home, but these things rot and stink...
Juju and Maya were so happy to have Daddy with us!