Sunday, February 15, 2015

Sight seeing in Pensacola.

The last two days have found us sightseeing around Pensacola, Pensacola Beach, NAS Pensacola, and Perdido Key.

We are staying at the Pensacola Elks Club which is a perfect location for seeing all the nearby sights. Yesterday we drove out to Pensacola Beach, stopped at the Elks club there and then walked out on the beach. The sand is white with a lot of shells in it. It also fills Clyda's reason for this trip and that was to walk on the white sands of Florida's panhandle beaches.

Eating boiled peanuts at the Pensacola Beach Elks Club.

Pensacola Beach white sand.

Did I mention that we ran into another Mardi Gras parade? This one in downtown Pensacola.


Part of the parade I presume.

Today we drove onto the Navy base here at Pensacola to see the Pensacola lighthouse and Fort Barrancas. The fort is awesome. We walked around the complete site admiring the brick work. The fort was built from 1839-1844 by slaves. It was constructed of 6000 bricks. All the arches were shaped by hand filing of the bricks. The guns were 24 pound canon which were only fired during a 2 day period by Confederate soldiers against Fort McRee on Perdido Key manned by Union soldiers. About 6000 rounds were exchanged.

The lighthouse is still in use today with a first order Fresnel lens.
 Galley inFort Branncas.
Awesome brickwork.


Parade ground atop the fort.


We drove to Perdido Key and had lunch at Sunset Grill which is a waterside seafood restaurant known for its spectacular sunsets. Great lunch.