St. Augustine, Florida - An End Destination

St. Augustine, Florida: Ponce de León, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, and John and Jane Grimsrud all sailed to St. Augustine making it their end destination.

Pictured below is the Dursmirg, the Grimsruds’ 46-foot motor sailing yacht, as it passed through the Bridge of Lions in Matanzas Bay. John and Jane were drawn to St. Augustine on their four month long maiden voyage from Superior, Wisconsin, and made the Oldest City their port of call.

That story and more St. Augustine based adventures are in their recently published books; Sailing Beyond Lake Superior and Sailing to St. Augustine, part of a four book series, which are available in paperback and digital editions from booksellers throughout the world.  Read more.

This is the famous Matanzas Bay on St. Augustine’s waterfront. It has been an anchorage to sailing ships for nearly five centuries.

St. Augustine, Florida: Home of Ponce de León of the 20th Century

Jimmy Ponce, a legend in his time now has a historical book dedicated to him.

Jimmy (James Augustine) Ponce was unquestionable St. Augustine’s single biggest promoter in modern times, a public spirited do-gooder who truly loved the Oldest City and put it on the map giving it international name recognition.

Read the rest of this fascinating story of the Ponce ancestry dating back to St. Augustine’s discovery and founding.  Then get to know this one-of-a-kind visionary who became our friend.

Sailing to St. Augustine by John M. Grimsrud is available from Amazon.com in paperback or Kindle digital edition…click this link.

St. Augustine, Florida, and the Secotan shrimp boat

A brief history of our Secotan that became a part of the St. Augustine fishing fleet;

Jane and I went in search of its history with information we obtained from the Federal Documentation Office, and here is what we found;

 In 1947 on the banks of Albemarle Sound at Manns Harbor, North Carolina, and a short distance from Kill Devil Hills, the spot of the Wright brother’s historic flight, a very special creation was brought into this world. Clarence Holmes contracted Belove Tillet to build a forty two-foot party boat.

The boat was built “by the rock of the eye,” with special care since it was designed to spend its life in and out of the most treacherous inlet on the East Coast of the United States; Oregon Inlet at Cape Hatteras. The talent that went onto this special vessel can only be appreciated by a person that has piloted it through the crashing seas of a deadly raging and unforgiving inlet…like a little duck in love with the water, the Secotan bounces and bobs along in the wildest of torrents…trust me for I have been there.

Secotan arriving at our dock in St. Augustine, Florida, 1980. George Tappin is standing on the bow and Jane on the stern.

What we were about to do next was not for everybody.

With our seamanship, navigational and boat building abilities, and a desire to do something totally different and exciting, we put our newly built dock to the perfect use.

We acquired a commercial fishing vessel.

This was not going to be like the good old days when any hayseed could drag some nets around and make a living. Cheap fuel and plentiful shrimp were gone.

The timing was right; we had the boat handling expertise and our youthful exuberance.

Jane and I had just finished constructing a dock in Hospital Creek at a piece of property we were developing adjacent to the “fabled Fountain of Youth”. Hospital Creek is where Ponce de León sailed up on April 2, 1513, when he was searching for the Fountain of Youth and discovered Florida.

For the rest of this interesting story read the book: Sailing to St. Augustine by John M. Grimsrud.  It is available from Amazon in paperback and Kindle editions.

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