Day 53 – Oysters

Miles Completed: 49.5

Cumulative miles: 2808.4

Miles to St Augustine: 296

Today we rode from Mexico Beach to St George Island. Mexico Beach was hit hard by hurricane Michael in 2018. As I rode through this quaint area, everything seems new and fresh, since much was rebuilt after that hurricane. The area is known as the “Forgotten Beach”. This is not a touristy area compared to other parts of the Gulf Coast. As I rode out at 9-10 in the morning, I did not see one person on the beach. It was so quiet and beautiful, and I see why they call it forgotten.

In the RV park where we camped last night, we saw an RV trailer completely flipped over on its top. We found out that a tornado hit that campground one month ago and several campers/RV’s were toppled over. It was a reminder of how lucky we’ve been with the weather on this trip.

Soon after we rode out of Mexico Beach, we crossed into the Eastern time zone. It is the fourth and last time zone we will travel through on this trip. Did you know that part of Florida’s panhandle is in the Central time zone? We had a question about that at a trivia night at Pebble Creek and got it right!

Along the way was the city of Apalachicola, the self-proclaimed Oyster Capital of the World. I did see oyster boats, oyster plants, and ate a dozen raw oysters later in the day. They were quite good so they can keep the title for now.

I made two stops in Apalachicola. Togan had stopped at a coffee shop and said they had affogato! I had no idea what that was, but soon found out it is a scoop of gelato with a shot of espresso poured over it. Awesome. Once I finished that, I saw a note that Felix and Dana were two doors down at the brewery, of course! I had one beer with them before we finished the ride to St George Island.

St George Island is about 5 miles off the Florida coast and we had to travel two long bridges to get there. One was 4 miles long and the other was 5 miles long. It’s been interesting seeing so much water and such large and long bridges, because I don’t see that in Arizona!

On the first bridge I saw two pelicans dive for fish while I was riding. I didn’t know that pelicans do a head first dive straight down like an Olympic diver to get the fish. It was really cool to see.

Felix and Dana and I went to a place called Paddy’s on St George Island. That’s where I had the dozen oysters. We enjoyed Paddy’s so much we walked back to it from our campground after dinner and this time Roy and Chris joined us. They had a trivia night and Monday Night Football. Another fun day and night.