March 4-19, 2006
Our next stop on our way up north was Jacksonville, Florida. We stayed at a very pretty city park called Hanna Park. It had everything a park should have: an ocean beach, a 60 acre lake for kayaking, lots of hiking and biking trails and beautiful tall trees. Pictured is the gorgious entrance to the park – lots of colorful flowers everywhere.
As you can see, our camp site was surrounded by beautiful pine trees and Florida foliage. Being heavily wooded, it gave us more privacy but it also gave us a lot more shade. Since it was still March (winter) and since we were in north Florida (not south Florida), the temperatures were alittle cooler than we were used to this winter. Joni felt we should have stayed in south Florida a few weeks longer. We’ll do that next time.
Delton continued his morning routine of walking along the beach every day. Then he would use his exercise bands for his upper body.
Then we would take leisure walks on the beach in the afternoon. Weekdays weren’t very crowded but weekends were pretty busy.
Delton has continued to enjoy playing tennis. We played singles a few times. While playing one afternoon, we noticed another couple playing on the court next to us who seemed to have a game very compatible to ours. We asked them if they would like to play doubles with us and they said they would. After one very long set, Don and Maryanne won 10 to 8. We talked about getting together again the following week, but Joni lost their phone number. What a bummer!!!!
The lake allowed Joni to continue her daily kayak rides. Pictured is Joni – ready to go again. 
Most days she saw 2 or 3 alligators sunning on an island in the middle of the lake.
There are about 15 miles of hiking and biking trails in this park. We went on a 3 mile hike one day which took us about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Everytime Delton stopped to look at the view, Joni pushed him on. Part of the trail was along the lake and Joni wasn’t about to get surprised by an alligator or snake. The trails were heavily wooded and almost as good as the mountain trails, without the big elevation changes.We took a drive along Route A1A to St. Augustine with our bikes in tow and enjoyed the scenery on the way. As luck would have it, our camera broke down that day, so we have no pictures of that beautiful old city. We saw the oldest wooden school house, historic Old St. Augustine, and many other historic spots, although a lot of the area was just a touist trap. We visited the Mission of Nombre DeDios (Name of God), the first permanent Christian settlement in the United States. Father Francisco Lopez de Mendoza Grajales, a Spanish Diocesan Priest, said the first Mass in the nation’s first parish here in St. Augustine.
St. Patrick’s Day was celebrated while we were in Hanna Park. The park hosts and snow birds put together a St. Patrick’s Day pot luck diner which we signed up for. The main course was Corned Beef and Cabbage – so many people chose the chicken alternative. As usual, we over ate! Pot lucks are always so good!
After 2 weeks in Jacksonville we were on to our next stop – Savannah, Georgia!
