A trip to the Ponce Inlet Lighthouse with Fishes was planned for the day. We packed a lunch and picnicked at the Lighthouse Park before exploring. We watched a little movie in the old wood shed/privy about the lighthouse and buildings before climbing the tower.
The tower had 203 steps and is one of the taller lighthouses at 175 feet. Its brick base is 8 feet thick. It is maintained by the Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse Preservation Association and is still a functioning lighthouse. The lighthouse raises money through the gift shop and events. One of the events that appealed to me is a toast to the moon. You can sign up to go up to the lighthouse on the night of the full moon just before sunset and watch the sunset and moon rise. The champagne involved is a little scary but they probably limit you to one toast, or you do that part after you climb down.
They have done a great job maintaining the lighthouse and the grounds. The keepers quarters are all restored and have museum exhibits. One of the cottages is set up as it was in 1887. You can look in a window at each room. There is a whole new building dedicated to the lenses. They have many different maritime lenses and buoy lights on display. Many other lighthouses and museums send their lenses here for restoration and repair. They restored one of the old lenses for placement in the current lighthouse. The original one is in the lens building.
Liam, Maverick and Grant climbed the 203 steps without a problem. They went to all the exhibits. Liam particularly liked a light display where you could play with bending a laser beam through a lens.
We read about Jean-Augustine Fresnel (pronounced frey-nel) who made huge advances in optics in his day and discovered the lens named for him and used by lighthouses. Apparently, he was thought to be a “slow” child and was sent to school originally just to accompany his brother but later showed some promise in geometry. He was trained to engineer roads and bridges. His passion, however was optics, and lenses and light became his legacy. He suffered with tuberculosis most of his life and died from it at age 39. The museum had great exhibits showing how much the lens could magnify the light from a single bulb.
After the lighthouse, we spent some time on the pirate ship and swings at the park. The boys had played hard and walked pretty far already. There was no complaint from any of them and Grant, at 5, was all in for any adventure. After the playground, he was asked if he wanted to go to the beach. “That sounds incredible,” he replied.
It was rough but we played at the edge of the waves until everyone was thoroughly soaked. We played in the sand for our drying time and then walked to a nearby restaurant for dinner.
All and all, it was close to 4 miles of walking and that may not include the 203 steps. Everyone was still happy, and hungry and thirsty.
It was hard to again say goodbye to Fishes. I know we will see them again but we do not know when. They are waiting on a part for their motor and when that is fixed, will head south. There is a chance they will come back to the Chesapeake later in the summer.
Once again we watched them take off in their dinghy. As we turned around to return to our dinghy, we noticed that all of the people at the restaurant were watching our goodbye, and Fishes’ departure with great interest. We assured them they were going to a bigger boat just around the corner.
We returned to Josie very tired ourselves. We cleaned up a bit from the day and headed to bed. We leave for St. Augustine in the morning. During the day we learned that Jeff and Deb crossed successfully and arrived safely in Ft. Pierce!
