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| TRAVELS WITH MY DINOSAUR 05 June - 05 August 2003 |
| Thursday 26th June. Hurray, I'm back by the ocean. If I could choose to live anywhere in the world, it would be beside the ocean. Any early start is worth the test for the reward of the sound and scent of the sea! Can you tell that I am very happy? Michelle was as good as her word, and the envelope was waiiting for me with tickets through to New Orleans. My coach also left right on time, which was a bonus, because the the two men sitting next to me spent half an hour speculating about how late it would be running - apparently it usually runs at least an hour late on week days during the rush hour. Well, not today. God is good! My 45 minute layover in Alabama's Capitol was rather enjoyable. As I waited in the queue for a drink, I fell into conversation with the lady standing next to me, a lovely bubbly woman from Mobile. Her car had broken down, she told me, so she was taking the bus. She was most inerested to hear about my trip to Children's Harbour - her sister is volunteering with a Girl Scouts Summer Camp called Scoutshire Woods, a highlight of the annual calander for the Girl Scouts movement in the Deep South of Alabama. The camp is near Citronelle, about 30 miles west of Mobile, and is a permanent lakeside facility with horse riding, canoeing, hiking trails, craft rooms and other activities available. Sounds delightful. The Girl Scouts of the Deep South Council serves over six thousand children in 8 counties surrounding Mobile and nearly two thousand volunteers. The mission of the Council is quite simle: to inspire the girls to be good, caring and faithful citiszens. This is the Promise they are taught: "On my honor, I will try to serve God and my Country To help people at all times And to live by the Girl Scout Law" and this is the Girl Scout Law: "I will do my best to be honest and fair, friendly and helpful, considerate and caring, courageous and strong, and responsible for what I say and do. And to respect myself and others, respect authority, use resources wisely, make the world a better place, and be a sister to every Girl Scout." The time flashed by so quickly in conversation with this delightful lady. As we parted ways, I shared my hopes for her car's speedy recovery. "aw now dear" she said. "if it wasn't fixin' to blow a pipe, I never wud've hapn'd on you now wud I? Some Things are worth the breakin'." I arrived in Pensacola mid-afternoon and took a cab to the Civic Inn, a respectable downtown hostelry where I have an en suite double room with air conditioning which mercifully works, and cable TV, for the heartening cost of �20 per night. As I was checking In, a young lady from the Rough Guide stopped by to review the place. I've always been interested to know how travel guide writers assess the hostels and hotels they include in their books, and she was keen to talk about her work. I went along with her to view a room - still being at the "deciding" phase, myself. We were both impressed with the friendliness of the manager, and his willingness to assist guests. "So many of the motel staff I meet are just brick walls" she said, "and that is really no good at all". I told her how helpful the staff had been at the Super 8 yesterday in Birmingham, offering to drive me to the hospital and back, and she said it's often recommendations like that, word of mouth, which single places out in the literature. We shook hands and she went on to the next place on her list. After a very quick and extremely refreshing dip in the remarkably clean pool, I took a stroll around town in the cool of the sub-tropical evening. I use "cool" in the loosest sense of the word, you understand, for the Florida coast is wilting in this late June heat, even as the day slowly, mercifully approaches its nightly refuge of darkness and slightly lower temperatures. A few minutes walk from where I am staying stands one of the most beautiful buildings I have encountered thus far on my travels, a delightful 1903 Spanish Renaissance structure - the home of the Episcopal congregation of Christ Church, Pensacola. A historical blurb just inside the main entrance helpfully told me that the congregation of Christ Church Episcopal was founded in 1827 after Florida became a Territory of the United States and religious freedom was granted. The General Missionary Society of the Episcopal Church sent the Rev. Ralph Williston to Pensacola in 1829 to establish a church in the town, and the original Church was completed in 1831 at Seville Square. The new building - the one I stood within - was constructed on Palafox St at the turn of the 20th Century to meet the growing needs of its expanding congregation As I stood back to take a photograph of the beautiful church, a passer-by - obviously a local - stopped to enjoy the view with me. "you know, this church has a lovely organ", he said, almost to himself, "a Gabriel Kney tracker action pipe. They have some wonderful concerts." "Really. Any at the moment?" What a wonderful was to spend my first evening in Pensacola� "No. They're just between series. Had some wonderful Harp and flute performances in May though." Oh what a shame! "They - you don't attend this church?" "Heck no. I think folks should consent themselves to baptism. I go to Trinity Baptist in Cantonment. You know it?". I shook my head. "I'm just visiting for a few days. It's a beautiful church isn't it?" "It sure is" he agreed, "and that organ is quite something. I still like the music here." "Are you a musician?" "music teacher. Elementary. They have a day school y'know, very active in the community. There are some other lovely churches around town. You should take a look at Christ Church on South Adams. It'll remind you of home. I always think it looks very English. It was the first home to this Church. The Presbyterians worshiped there too. Used to be the city library for a while back in the 50s". "Thank you very much" I said as I began to pack the camera away. "Have you been to England?" "only in the movies. I keep telling myself one of these days, but things always happen, y'know." "Do the things you want to while you have the chance to do them" I said. "You never know how long those opportunities will be available". He looked at me for a moment, as though he wanted to ask me something, but couldn't figure out the question. Then the moment passed, and he began to give me directions to South Adams. As I walked east, away from the bustle of Palafox Drive, the main artery of downtown life, I happened upon another delightful church, the First Methodist Church of Pensacola, situated almost on the corner of East Wright Street. It's another turn-of-the-century place of worship which has evolved with its congregation as the current place of worship after several other locations passed into the annals of history. Nestled among the unimaginative, box-like structures surrounding it, the graceful sandstone exterior and stained glass windows make for picture postcard viewing - quite a lovely sight. The Church is beautiful inside and out. I love the display of light cast about a room by the sun glowing through stained glass on a bright summer's evening, and this was one of the best! It's such a peaceful experience: a wonderful cascade of iridescent brilliance. It didn't matter that the windows were too far away for me to make out the images. The sheer glory of the sparkling rainbow exhibition before me was quite enough to satisfy. I could have easily spent hours in quiet meditation at that wonderful church on Wright Street. In spite of it's current glorious existence, the First United Methodist Church had very unpretentious beginnings, so reads the obligatory historical literature beside the vestry. It was born in 1821 when the Mississippi Conference sent one Reverend Alexander Talley to Pensacola to establish a mission among the heathens of north west Florida. Meetings were initially held in the courthouse and the theatre before a church was built In 1828 at the corner of Intendencia and Tarragona Streets. The building was gutted by two fires though and a new sanctuary was eventually constructed at the corner of Palafox and Garden St in 1881. Even so, the congregation was severely depleted by two yellow fever epidemics during the first twenty years, and many thought the church would die out. The church began to grow rapidly though, and at the turn of the 20th Century, it put out its own successful missions and congregational plants, which gradually became independent churches. In 1910, the Mother Church moved again to its present site at East Wright Street, and as the other circuit churches progressed, the name "First Church" was adopted by the congregation. To the right of the church sits The Wright Place, a Parish activity centre which opened in 1983, was badly damaged by fire almost immediately and opened again a year later. This church should have been called the Phoenix, it's endured so many fires. I wondered if The Wright Place was a play on words, but although there were plenty of people milling around, there was no one available to ask, so I headed on towards South Adams, and the old Christ Church. The walk was a little long, but only because of the heat - amazing, given that it was gone 6pm. However, I wasn't in a hurry to get there, so I took my time and enjoyed a leisurely break over a welcome iced drink, just watching the world go by. When my glass was almost empty, I realised I was actually at Seville Square, just across from my target! Seville Square is in the heart of the historic district of downtown Pensacola. Old Christ Church is built on one level in the Gothic revival style, with a tower and spire. It was constructed between 1830 and 1832 at a cost of �2,860, but just a few years ago - less than 165 years after its foundations were laid - the Historic Pensacola Preservation Board restored the church for the princely sum of �5,087,440! The history of Chris Church actually dates back to 1764 though. In that year, the Bishop of London commissioned the Reverend William Dawson to take the Anglican Church to Pensacola. He was successfully followed by two more Anglican Ministers, and the congregation flourished until the Spanish took control of the area again in1781. During the Civil War, almost the entire Confederate population of Pensacola fled to Alabama. The downtown location of Christ Church made it an ideal base for Union troops, and they occupied it as a hospital and barracks throughout much of the conflict. Services were held at Christ Church by Baptists, Presbyterians and Episcopalians until the mid 1800s, when they began to organise their own denominational premises around the town, but it continued to preside as the central meeting place of the local Christian community until the end of the century. Between the 1930s and 50s, the site housed the Pensacola municipal library, and today it serves as a venue for concerts, recitals, lectures, and weddings, and as grand town hall for the communities of Pensacola and Pensacola Beach. It still whispers an ecclesiastical theme, and although I couldn't find any signs saying so, I imagine it still hosts religious services of a non-matrimonial kind. Light began, almost imperceptibly, to fade into another balmy night, and I made my way back along the still busy streets of this happy seaside holiday town. The salty sea air seems to linger about the town tonight with a specially jubilant summertime bliss. As I walked along a quiet residential street, my senses were awakened by the most enchanting front garden, filled with the scent of an Oxfordshire country village - roses, honeysuckle, and a wonderful treat for me, that of two hummingbirds flitting around the scarlet sage. I was lucky to have my camera out at the time, else I could easily have mistaken the tiny hummingbird for bumble bees, due to the low buzzing sound they emit. I wanted to take a longer peak, because it's a rare chance one does not get in cold old England, but I was also aware that this was someone's private property. I didn't want them to discover me "watching" their garden through a Carl Zeiss lens. The urge was too great however. I heard my earlier words of wisdom to the elementary music teacher echoing in my head, and boldly knocked on the door of a complete stranger to ask if I might continue to watch the antics of her airborne visitors. The owner of the garden turned out to be a real dear, and a fount of knowledge about attracting hummingbirds into the American "yard". She was so welcoming that I felt as though she had been waiting all week just for a wondering young English girl to knock upon her door and ask for permission to watch the hummingbirds feeding from her fine floral array out front! After setting us both up with iced tea and biscuits on the front lawn, Catherine explained that gardening to attract hummingbirds is easier in Florida than maintaining bird feeders, because the sugar water she used to put on her feeder fermented in the heat and could potentially cause salmonella poisoning and kill the hummingbirds if it wasn't changed several times each day. The hummingbird I had spotted is the Ruby-throated variety, but the female actually has a white throat. In the bird kingdom, it's the male who puts on the show to impress his mate. Many people think the Rubythroat is the only kind to be found east of the Mississippi river, Catherine says she's recorded at least two other types visiting her garden during the past year: the Rufous Hummingbird and the Bahama Woodstar, and nine species have been officially noted in the State. Hummingbirds are tiny. A fully grown adult weighs just three grams. Imagine how minuscule the chicks are when first hatched! The flight across the Gulf of Mexico to their wintering grounds must seem like a never-ending expanse of water to the Hummingbird, yet they fly non-stop for 500 miles, their tiny delicate wings beating 78 times per second. Catherine was amused by my amazement. "oh they are little show dancers" she agreed. ", and it's quite a myth that they hitch a ride on the geese too. During the male courting dive, his wings beat 200 times per second. He really has to work hard to impress his lady friend." I asked Catherine if Hummingbirds feed entirely on nectar, and she explained that they do gain much of their nourishment from nectar-rich plants like columbine, phlox, sweet william and honeysuckle, but they also catch small insects like spiders, and occasionally even worms. She also explained that she had designed her garden to be long and narrow, with curved flower beds and clusters of trees and shrub tubs so that the hummingbirds can access flowers more easily from all sides. For a downtown garden, it's very blessed with space, and well laid out, with a great deal of thought. It runs along the side of the house and opens up into a larger space behind. Towards the front, a flowerbed has been brought to life with an assortment of fascias, phlox, nasturtium, begonia, petunia, the scarlet sage I mentioned earlier, and a lovely deep pink flower I didn't recognise, but am reliable informed it's name is snapweed. All the flowers have been carefully researched for their hummingbird point-score. This garden is a hummingbird's dream - everything about it has been planned out, designed and instrumented to attract the tiny little creature to this small patch of urban Florida, and Catherine's time and patience has paid reaped many rewards. By the time we had emptied the pitcher of iced tea, the sky was quite dark. I was happy to walk back to the Civic Inn alone, but Catherine would not hear of such things. She insisted on driving me back to my room for the night. We were heading for the door when she said "well, what will you be doing for dinner?" "Oh, I planned to just pick something up on the way home" I said as I hitched my bag onto my shoulder. "well would you consider sharing my table?" she asked. "It won't be anything special. I wasn't expecting visitors, but it isn't often that I get company and I'd be honoured to entertain you". So we talked for another hour over chicken pasta salad and, and I silently thanked God that I was actually eating a healthy meal for once during my trip! I truly enjoyed my time with Catherine. She is a delightfully hospitable lady whose genuine enthusiasm and easy ways made for a thoroughly delightful and memorable evening. God bless and sweet dreams. |