I’m about thirty feet in the air, balancing on a small swinging log when I stop to stare down at the alligator below. The huge, wide reptile basks in Florida’s mild winter sunshine. Around me, roseate spoonbills nest in the treetops. It’s a viewpoint you can only get from the ropes and zip line course called Crocodile Crossing at the Saint Augustine Alligator Farm Zoological Park. People have been coming here for thrilling encounters with massive reptiles since 1893, making it one of the state’s oldest attractions. But soaring over gator pits on a zip-line gives a perspective that would have had Victorian era ladies reaching for their smelling salts. It was a high point in my trip to Saint Augustine as I explored its outdoorsy activities, history and the new Saint Augustine Mocktail Trail.
Outdoors Saint Augustine
Saint Augustine is on Florida’s Atlantic coast 40 miles south of Jacksonville. For water lovers, there’s a lot to explore—ocean, rivers and wetlands. I stayed at the friendly and comfortable Holiday Inn Express Vilano Beach, about five miles from downtown Saint Augustine. If I got up in time, I could join other sunrise-lovers on the beach just a few blocks from my hotel.
I had a chance to go both stand up paddle boarding and kayaking during my visit. One morning my friend and travel biz colleague Barbara Golden, communications manager for St. Augustine, Ponte Vedra & The Beaches Visitors and Convention Bureau, picked me up at 7:30 AM. We met AyoLane Halusky for a morning paddle at Deep Creek, about half an hour southwest of Saint Augustine. AyoLane runs a tour and nature education company called Earth Kinship. One of the first things I noticed about him was that he had a big cottonmouth tattooed on one forearm and a banded water snake on the other. A nifty educational tool for a naturalist to help people differentiate between these two snakes. We put in our kayaks and meandered through the swampy habitat, spotting turtles, herons and anhingas.
AyoLane chose the name for his company because he believes in humans being in kinship with nature, rather than stewardship—a word that assumes we know how to take care of nature and should impose our will upon it. He wants people to appreciate Florida’s ecosystems, rather than fear them. “It’s not a big scary place with monsters that will come and attack us. We’re the ones that need to quiet down.” Toward the end of our paddle, we each chose a spot at some distance from each other and backed our kayaks into the greenery. Then we sat in silence for ten minutes. A small gator poked its head up to check out Barbara, then receded back into the creek.
You can also paddle in downtown Saint Augustine. Join Saint Augustine Eco Tours and kayak past buildings that are more than 400 years old.
If you’re not a paddler, you can get out on the water with one of the many boat tour companies. I took a cruise with Red Boat Tours, which combined history, nature, and the wonderful feel of an ocean breeze. The people running the tour were very kind and Captain James cracked me up with some of his comments. At one point, a man rowed by shirtless in a canoe and Captain James said, “That’s naked Jerry. Thank God he’s got his pants on today.”
Shark tooth hunting is another fun beachy activity for all ages. The ever-moving ocean exposes fossil shark teeth on many area beaches. Barbara is a champion hunter with a trained eye. I wasn’t so good at it, but it was fun trying.
History
Saint Augustine prides itself on being the US’ oldest continuously occupied settlement of European and African American origin. Founded in 1565, that means Spaniards arrived in Saint Augustine 55 years before the Pilgrims laid eyes on Plymouth Rock. So, if you like visiting historical sites, you’ll have many to choose from, both in downtown Saint Augustine and in the surrounding area. There’s a brand-new Black History app that delves into the city’s rich African American history, from the 1500s up through civil rights struggles.
I started my exploration of downtown with a 1 hour, 40-minute open-air ride on Old Town Trolley Tours. Pro tip: Sure, this is Florida, but if you visit in January, bring a warm jacket. It’s a slow tour—you could walk the distance faster—but the guides are entertaining and it’s a good historical overview.
Saint Augustine’s most iconic structure is Castillo de San Marcos, the US’ oldest masonry fort. The runner-up is probably Flagler College, built as the Ponce de Leon Hotel by uber-rich 19th century industrialist and Florida developer Henry Flagler. Tour it and check out the amazing Tiffany windows and chandeliers.
My tastes run toward over-the-top aesthetics, the bizarre and macabre. I loved Villa Zorayda, a house built in 1883 by an eccentric millionaire trying to capture the 13th century Moorish ambiance of Spain’s Alhambra Palace. I was especially taken with the turquoise, lapis and dark red accents, the harem room with its intricately carved window covering and, best of all, the world’s oldest existing rug. The cursed 2400-year-old rug depicts a cat and is made entirely of cat hair. It hangs on the wall because anyone who walks on it dies!
Tour guide Katie Timoney explained 400-year-old methods of amputation and trephination and showed me the tools of the trade at the Spanish Military Hospital Museum. Laudanum, a tincture made from opium and alcohol, was the favored anesthesia. “People would be conscious but sort of remember it like having a bad dream,” she said. “Or else they’d faint. Which would probably be best for all involved.”
Just about any self-respecting Saint Augustine building claims at least one ghost. Hear their stories on a tour with Ghost Tours of Saint Augustine.
Outside of downtown, a ferry trip to 18th-century Fort Matanzas National Monument, 14 miles south of Saint Augustine, was scenic and fun. And you could spend a couple of hours learning about maritime archeology, boat building and life as a lighthouse keeper at the gorgeous black and white striped Saint Augustine Lighthouse. Climb the 219 stairs for a 360-degree view.
Cat Therapy
The biggest problem with my life as a travel writer is missing my cat. Although it sometimes makes me feel dirty, I find myself seeking feline companionship at cat cafes. Saint Augustine has two, which is astounding for a city of only 15,000. I visited both.
Witty Whisker Cat Café is downtown, so it provides a nice cat and coffee break in the midst of historical touring. I bought a $1.50 bag of cat treats and befriended the 18 resident cats. Hostess Skirmante Danial made me an oat milk cappuccino complete with a cat face design in the foam! What does Danial like about working at a cat café? “Everything. Everything,” she told me. “I worked with animals for most of my life. I was in the veterinary field. That’s where I realized I had some healing properties in me.” She’s now a certified animal massage and reiki therapist. “I’ve helped many, many animals and keep on going.” The café opened in 2020 and had found homes for 457 cats by the day of my visit. They offer special events like painting with cats, yoga and meowditation.
The next day I visited Frisky Cat Café, which was larger and had between 40 and 50 resident cats. There was lots of space for playing—and most of these cats wanted to play, if they weren’t sleeping. I felt like an orchestra conductor waving a feathered wand in front of half a dozen cats at a time. There’s also a kitten room.
Mocktail Trail
Full disclosure: My visit helped create the Saint Augustine Mocktail Trail. I mention this because we as nondrinkers can influence the world around us.
“We met and you had told me that you were looking for sober travel,” Barbara said as we sat at The Floridian drinking Original Sin non-alcoholic White Widow cider. “And I had been following along with the trends that there is a need for mocktails to appear on menus.” She started noting the best restaurants for mocktails and created a trail for those looking to drink less (or no) alcohol when out and about.
During my five days in Florida, we visited several of these places. At the 1912 Ocean Bar and Rooftop in Ponte Vedra, north of Saint Augustine, I had the Faux-Pache, made with Fever Tree Ginger Beer, pineapple, lime and fresh mint. At Catch 27 in downtown Saint Augustine, I went wild and had two mocktails. The All Bark consisted of preserved lemon, grapefruit, Giffard aperitif, and orgeat. For dessert, I drank a Mr. Snuffleupagus, made of house spiced Thai tea and coconut cream. Fans of zero-proof wines will find a few at Pesca Rooftop Kitchen and Bar at Hyatt Place Vilano Beach.
I didn’t make it to Chez L’Amour, but it has a well-rounded N/A section on its menu with four drinks, including the intriguing Bandleader, a concoction of beet, almond, fennel, lemon and NA aperitif. Barbara plans to expand the mocktail trail as more restaurants and bars get on the non-alc bandwagon.
Drinking and Sobriety in Saint Augustine
Like many touristy and non-touristy places, bars abound. “Saint Augustine likes to drink,” our trolley guide said as she stopped at a distillery and suggested that a bottle of rum would be a nice tip for her services.
“I think it’s kind of overtaken the city a little bit,” Nicholas Wilson, owner of the Spanish Military Hospital Museum, said of the bars. “It loses a bit of its charm.” The city’s old tagline “a quaint little drinking town with a fishing problem” has also lost its relevance. “Back in the day it was a very cute bumper sticker to have on your car,” Wilson said. “But I guess maybe because I am sober now, I see things more clearly. But also, times have changed.” He stressed that he’s not against alcohol but thinks it could be better regulated for everybody’s safety.
Despite the bars, Wilson says Saint Augustine is a great place to be sober. “The recovery community in this town is very large.” He and his sober friends find plenty to do. “We go play pool. We still go bowling. We go to Topgolf in Jacksonville. We get ice cream at night, and we go shopping, walking around. We do go into places and have appetizers and stuff. We just do all of it without having an alcoholic beverage. Everything that we did with alcohol we can do without.”
And that’s what I found, too. From gators to beaches to haunted forts, it would take a long time to run out of things to do in Saint Augustine.
About Teresa Bergen
Teresa Bergen had the great good fortune to quit drinking very young and has enjoyed long-term sobriety. She lives in Portland, Oregon but travels all over the world as a travel writer. She also works in the oral history field, helping to document and preserve history. Learn more HERE.
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