Florida Beach Time

The beaches at St. Augustine are wide and flat, with not a whole lot of good seashells. Still, we found that the Matanzas River Inlet about four miles south of TD & Kathy's condo was a great place for a walk and hopefully, at least a few shells. Here's a website that talks about shelling here:http://www.jaxshells.org/matzan.htm.

We found a few small shells, but there were a few starfish lying about that were more interesting.

We've learned that the blue jellyfish are the Portuguese Man of

War (thanks Terri). According to National

Geographic (http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/invertebrates/portuguese-man-of-war/) they are not only NOT jellyfish, but they are not a single animal either. They are actually a mutualistic combination of four different species living in close association. Well - so much for that. How about this one (above). Is this a jellyfish?

Now, we haven't mentioned yet that we've been joined by Pat's brother Bob and his wife Debbie for a few days at the beach. It turns out they were just a few miles away for a tennis tournament and decided to spend a few days with us at the condo. Bob and Pat went to tour Fort Matanzas (http://www.nps.gov/foma/index.htm) while Debbie and I rode bikes the four miles down the beach back to the condo. Here's the fort and some of its artillery. It was built to protect the back way in to St. Augustine and it only ever fired a single shot.