in addition to seeing the peacocks, we were able to see some new sights in st. augustine. (well, new to us!) in the past, we have admired the exterior of flagler college but have never taken the guided tour until this year. the tour was rich with facts and trivia about the old hotel ponce de leon, which was a popular winter destination of the rich and famous in the late 1800s built by tycoon henry flagler.
this hotel was the first building in florida to have electricity, thanks to thomas edison. with thousands of light bulbs decorating the courtyard, the entrance to this elaborate hotel must have been more than stunning! decorated by louis tiffany (of tiffany and co.), no detail was left untouched.
guests stayed a minimum of 3 months, and while the men conducted business, the ladies socialized in the grand parlor. the picture below is of the ornate parlor ceiling (painted the trademark "tiffany blue".)
this thomas edison clock was the first electric clock in a public building. the tour guide talked about how unique this clock is because edison designed it so that if you were standing in the middle of it, you would be able to read the numbers.... the 4 is IIII vs. IV, and the Vs are upside down. welllll, so are the numbers on the clock sitting in my foyer, as well as the clock that was in my living room growing up. and i am pretty sure thomas edison didn't make those! ha! so apparently, edison's idea caught on and eventually became standard operating procedure. but the clock is still really pretty!
this once-prestigious hotel is now a private liberal arts university. the students still use the original dining hall, which is quite a treat for the eyes! the gold paint that you see on the walls is actually gold. the vaulted ceilings are covered in murals. the room is filled with tiffany stained glass windows. i don't know about you, but my college cafeteria was nothing like this place!
a close-up of the tiffany windows in the dining hall... aren't they pretty?
this portion of the mosaic floor in the rotunda shows the only flaw in the whole floor--an intentional one. look at the top left of the second triangle from the left... while the other triangles have a white triangle in the corner, this triangle is completely black. this imperfection was flagler's proclamation that only God is perfect. that was my favorite part of the whole tour. :)
ethan loved these "spitting" frogs that circled the fountain in the courtyard! with 12 frogs around it, the fountain functions as a real sundial. the frogs also represent the 12 apostles. i think there was more symbolism about the fountain, but caroline was really tired of the tour by this point, so i missed some trivia attempting to entertain her.
we also toured the san sebastian winery, which was interesting to learn about how wine is made. afterwards, they offered a free wine tasting, so the kids sat at our feet eating pretzels while we tasted a bunch of wines. it's a good thing that there was a metal bucket for you to pour out the wines you don't care for because i didn't like a single one! that is no reflection on the quality of their wines... i just don't care for wine at all. but most of the people were leaving the winery with boxes of wine, so it must be good to those who like it! but brian was able to get some good photos while we were there, so it was worth the trip! :)
we did not get to spend nearly as much time at the pool as i'd hoped. this was partly because the weather was cooler than expected, but we also spent more time downtown than i thought we would. we enjoyed one fun morning at the pool... poor brian spent half the time taking ethan potty, so we did not get as many pool pictures as i'd hoped (but we have the whole summer for that!). check out caroline's bling bling flipflops!! it took a good 5 minutes to smush her feet into those things!
ethan delighted in wishing me and all the ladies he saw yesterday a "happy muver's day!" over and over. he even walked up to kristie's mom unprompted and offered her the sweet greeting, and i think it made her day. :)
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