Chris is still on pre-move vacation so we used Monday to get one of my last National Park Passport stamps in the southeast region: Fort Matanzas! This is that one south of St. Augustine we tried to go to right after non-hurricane Fay when it was closed. Before we even get to the monument we see a big, fat spider.
Yikes! The ferry to the fort wasn’t running, but who cares, they’re all starting to look alike to me anyway. I mean, “this is the French fort for fighting the Spanish,” “This is the Spanish fort for fighting the British,” “This is the British fort for fighting the Spanish,” and “No surprise no one was building forts against the French, because this is the fort where they were all killed because of the lack of fresh, gourmet food available during the winter.” And that’s the one here:
Well, let’s go on the half-mile nature walk! I suggested. Chris was non-plussed. It was a nice, short walk through Floridian underbrush, and oh, were there spiders….
The spiders were not alone; I’ve seen these rainbow salamanders all across Florida but can’t figure out what they’re called. And a duo of stick bugs. 
We were out of time to go to the beach, so we got Floridian Christmas ornaments in St. Augustine instead and had coffee and cupcakes at Luli’s Cupcakes. Of course I had the pumpkin one—Monday was its first day as flavor of the month! Poor Chris; I looked across the tiny pink table and he’s sitting in this tiny blue chair in a pink room under a lamp made of paper cupcake holders. He’d already devoured his cupcake and was sweetly suffering through the pinkness while I finished my coffee. I am married to the most gracious man in the world. 🙂 
