Amelia Island

Adam & I arrived around 10 p.m on Friday night. It was blustery and cold out; the wind was blowing in off the Atlantic across the street from our hotel.   We were given a deluxe king with ocean view…because…I asked for a top floor room? We got lucky? because I didn’t pay for an ocean view.  All I know is we walked in and realized we got the best view in the place-even though it was pitch black out. Score 1 for the Young's.

Fast forward to oh…730 am.  Our room has this glow coming from the window. The sun is coming up and I mean she’s not joking around. Adam peeled back the curtains and as much as we wanted to see this miracle us west coasters never get to see we couldn’t look at it.  It was soooo bright! like LED flashlight in your eyes bright!  I kept saying take a picture, but Adam recalled hearing that photographing the direct sun is bad for your lens.  So we shut the curtain and went back to sleep.  Thank goodness for black out curtains.

We had a great weekend tooling around the island.  It was surprisingly bigger than we expected; Wal-Mart, McDonald’s, Publix AND Food Lion. 

We spent some time at the State Park and Fort Clinch

 

had a nice lunch in historic downtown Fernandina; drank some wine; browsed bookshops and Adam took a bunch of pictures.

         

Oh ya! and we saw Pippi Longstockings house! (Not open to the public)

After an ok dinner at Joe’s 2nd Street Bistro we headed to the Palace Saloon.  Florida Oldest continuing running bar.  Adam tried the famous Pirates Punch and we hung out there until we figured we should head back while we still could.

Sunday we found the Catholic Church (standing room only!) packed up and checked out.  We had decided we’d see the south side of the Island then head back to Tampa around 3.  Well after driving south-and not seeing much we continued and decided to take the scenic route back.

We crossed off of Amelia Island on to Big Talbot Island and pulled off at a State Park.  After following a man made trail towards the beach we found a quick drop off and huge trees fallen on the beach below. 

It was so cold and the picnic blanket I had brought for us to sit on became my cloak.  Adam snapped some pictures while I followed him around with my glass of wine (you know, to warm me up )

We ended up not finding any more interesting places to stop and before we knew it we were back on 301 headed to Tampa.  I asked Adam when we were back in the car, “So what was your favorite part?” And he replied “Spending time with you”  “No fair” I yelled,  “that was my answer!”  But in the end that was what the trip was really about, being together.  We could have went to the beach back home or bought books at Borders or watched the football game in any bar, but we chose to leave our chores, responsibilities and doggies at home and devote a good 48 hours to nothing but us on a little Island in North Florida.  Thanks Amelia for a wonderful weekend.