Great Getaway of the Month

Fernandina Beach/
Amelia Island, Fla.
 Isle of Eight Flags

By Nancy and Richard Woodworth

The eight flags that have flown over historic Amelia Island are unfurled daily across the front of Florida ’s oldest surviving hotel.

They add color to the evocative, two-tone green and red facade of the Florida House Inn. And they add to the festive feeling of an island with a swashbuckling past, a developing present and a promising future.

Amelia Island is a thirteen-mile-long stretch of sand and palms northeast of Jacksonville . Separated from Georgia only by the Cumberland Sound, Florida ’s northernmost barrier island more resembles Georgia ’s Golden Isles than Florida in its climate, topography and lifestyle. Its location at what was the early frontier of Florida explains its shifting fortunes. Discovered by the French in 1562, it has been ruled by Spanish, British, pirates, patriots and Confederates – the only U.S. territory to have survived under eight different flags.

Touted as "The Queen of Summer Resorts" by American Resorts magazine in 1896, the island lost its initial luster as Henry Flagler’s railroad drew tourists to the "new Florida " farther south. Fernandina Beach , the island’s only town, became embedded in a Victorian time capsule – a Southern copy of what happened up north to Cape May , N.J.

Development occurred rather lately as the Amelia Island Plantation and Ritz-Carlton resorts lured vacationers for broad beaches and 90 holes of golf. The opening of the Ritz in 1990 gave the island cachet, and sleepy Fernandina Beach awoke with a flurry of upscale inns and B&Bs, restaurants and shops. With 450 ornate structures built before 1927 and few since, the 50-block historic district was ripe for the Victorian B&B experience.

The island is more a "feeling" than an array of tourist attractions. Other than golfing and beaching, the main pastime for visitors is to walk the streets of Fernandina’s historic district, enjoying the richest concentration of Victorian architecture between Cape May and Key West . Besides the oldest hotel, the town offers Florida ’s oldest saloon and its only oral history museum. It’s the shrimping capital of America , and stages an annual Shrimp Festival the first weekend of May.

Amelia Island is making up for lost time in terms of development, and locals wonder what the future has in store. But the core town of Fernandina Beach will remain attached to its past, drawing visitors who prefer it that way.

Diversions

The ocean is the draw for many visitors to Amelia Island . The white Appalachian quartz beaches framed by magnificent dunes are mild in winter and cooling in summer.

Historic Fernandina. Billed as a quaint Victorian seaport, the 50-block historic district is listed on the National Register. The "seaport" today is not much more than a harbor marina and the home base of the nation’s largest shrimping fleet. Nearly 80 percent of Florida ’s sweet Atlantic white shrimp are harvested in Amelia’s waters. A bronze and copper monument to Fernandina shrimpers sits atop a twelve-foot tower of granite. Visitors may watch the return of the shrimp boats and tour the Burbank Trawl Makers (known as the Net House to locals), the world’s largest producer of handmade shrimp nets. Next door to the Net House is Standard Marine (at North Second and Alachua), one of the largest marine hardware stores and suppliers of shrimping gear on the East Coast. Just east of the docks is the 1899 depot for Florida ’s first cross-state railroad, now the Chamber of Commerce visitor center, and a replica caboose.

More than 400 structures were built prior to 1927. A walking tour leads visitors past the most historic business buildings along Centre Street and the sherbet-hued, Victorian mansions of the Silk Stocking District. The latter are concentrated along South Seventh, North Sixth and Alachua streets. Adorned with the opulent gingerbread of the period, they include Queen Anne, Italianate, Chinese Chippendale, Florida Vernacular and Mississippi Steamboat masterpieces.

Replica gas lanterns, benches, floral planters bedecked with bright red begonias and cobblestone walks front the multi-hued brick buildings of palm-lined Centre Street , the main business thoroughfare. Among the landmarks is the Palace Saloon, Florida ’s oldest watering hole. Adorned with handpainted murals, it looks like a saloon of the wild west. A potent Pirate’s Punch is dispensed from a 40-foot-long mahogany bar graced by handcarved caryatids. Up the street is the Nassau County Courthouse, built in 1891 and considered the finest surviving Victorian courthouse in Florida . Equally impressive is the 1912 post office, a three-story edifice. Beside it is the Lesesne House, a handsome Southern residence built in 1860. South Seventh is notable for the Tabby House, built of crushed oyster shells, and the four stunning Egmont houses, constructed in 1901 of lumber from the old Egmont Hotel on the site.

Horse-drawn carriage tours of the historic district are offered by Old Towne Carriage Co., 277-1555. Sea Horse Stable, 261-4878, offers beachside horseback riding. 

Amelia Island Museum of History, 233 South Third St. , Fernandina Beach .
The renovated 1935 county jail houses Florida ’s only oral history museum. Displays and live interpretation portray the island’s history from aboriginal Indian settlements to 18th-century plantations to the present. The museum also conducts walking tours of the historic district Thursday and Friday afternoons at 3.
(904) 261-7378. Open Monday-Saturday, 10 to 4, Sunday 1 to 4.  Adults, $7.

Fort Clinch State Park , 2601 Atlantic Ave. , Fernandina Beach .
This park has 8,400 feet of shoreline along the Atlantic Ocean , Cumberland Sound and the Amelia River . Its focal point is the brick outpost begun in 1847 by the federal government. It was occupied first by Confederate forces and then Union troops during the Civil War, and abandoned after the Spanish-American War. The walled fort’s history comes alive as park rangers, clad in Union uniforms, carry out the daily chores of the garrison soldier and answer questions as if the year were 1864. Special full-garrison re-enactments and candlelight tours are offered periodically. The visitor center houses exhibits explaining the fort’s history. The park is also home to unspoiled beaches, a nature trail that winds through a coastal hummock and around a manmade pond, a 1,500-foot fishing pier and the island’s only campgrounds.
(904) 277-7274. Park open daily, 8 to sundown; fort, 9 to 5. Park admission: $5 per vehicle. Fort $2.

Golf. Leading golf-course architects have incorporated Amelia Island ’s natural beauty – from ocean bluffs to intracoastal marshes – to create 90 holes of great golf. The 27-hole Fernandina Beach Golf Club is considered one of the finest public courses in the Southeast. Amelia Island Plantation, a 1,250-acre sanctuary on the island’s southern tip, touts both a Pete Dye and Tom Fazio course combination of 45 holes and is recognized as one of the top twelve golf resorts in America . Gene Littler and Mark McCumber designed the eighteen-hole layout of the Golf Club of Amelia Island, located near the Ritz-Carlton.

Shopping. Centre Street is the home of the bulk of downtown stores, although newcomers are popping up on side streets. Housed in an 1873 building with hardwood floors and a pressed-tin ceiling, Southern Touch offers Battenberg lace and a potpourri of collectibles with a Victorian and French country ambiance. Aptly named, The Unusual Shop is notable for jewelry, clothing and ceramic tiles. The Ship’s Lantern offers wooden hand-carved sea life. Celtic Charm stocks unusual Irish gifts. Among clothing shops are Tilted Anchor, Pineapple Patch and Last Flight Out. Pause for a pick-me-up – coffee, candy, ice cream or what have you – at Fernandina’s Fantastic Fudge, The Snak Shak Co., Amelia Island Gourmet Coffee or 27 North.

Other favorites are down island at Palmetto Walk, fifteen shops modeled after tin-roof school houses with verandas, and at the Village Shops adjacent to Amelia Island Plantation.

Material updated from Inn Spots & Special Places in the Southeast, by Nancy and Richard Woodworth. Copyright 2000.

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