Petanque US Open

If you weren't here this weekend you missed an absolutely gorgeous weekend with so much to see and do. The wether was typical for this time of year with 75 degrees and sunny. Except at night when it got dark but the local nightlife was worth taking in. The Green Turtle had a world-class blues band, a great jazz trio was playing at Cafe Karibo, there was latin dance night at Indigo Alley and house bands were playing at the Palace and at O'Kanes. Shannon and I even got the chance to go to the Turtle after our happy hour to listen to the band and have a tasty dinner.

The daylight hours had plenty to do as well. The regular Farmer's Market was held Saturday morning and there were Veteran's Day goings on at Fort Clinch. The big event this weekend though was the Petanque (Pay-tonk) tournament down at the marina. Petanque is kind of a cross between horse-shoes and bocci. We had 180 players in the tournament most of whom were from Europe and Canada. The tournament was a big success based on both the number of participants but also by the smiles on everyone's faces down there this afternoon.

Please excuse the tournament photo shown here. It is hard to get an action shot of petanque as there is a lot of standing around by the players as they wait for their turn. Kind of like getting action shots at a curling bonspiel.

Next weekend is a big weekend for the B&B owners in town.. The Annual Cookie Tour takes place on Saturday. The inns will all be decorated in holiday style and at each inn on the tour you can sample their signature cookie and pick up a recipe card as well. If you stay with us for the weekend we'll even give you a couple of tour tickets!

The House Next Door

What a difference a year makes! Back in September of 2008 I wrote about the house next door to the Addison. It has been through several renovations over the last century and has been used to house civil war prisoners (in the now-missing 3rd floor), has been a house and has been used as a restaurant by the last two owners.

The current owners have renovated the building back to residential use and have done a great job. Their contractor has done a great job rebuilding the house and has rebuilt everything from the foundations to the chimneys. There is some (as in not much) original framing in the building and the decks on three sides of the house are original but he has rebuilt pretty much everything else. He rebuilt all of the bearing walls, replaced all of the windows, doors, siding, electric and plumbing. This house will easily stand for another 100 years after all the work that has been done.

The first two pictures are the "before" pics. You can see the concrete block storage building on the right side. That has been removed and the two decks have been wrapped around the side of the building giving complete wrap-around decks. The back yard has been cleared of storage sheds and propane tanks and will be a bricked patio with a fire pit.

There is still some landscaping to do and the interior decorators start on Monday but the outside structure only has a bit of painting needed and it will be done. The second set of two pictures are the "after" shots of the building.

Vernon has been a good neighbor for a construction contractor. By law they are allowed to start banging and hammering at 7:00. With only rare exceptions they held of any noisy work until 8 or 8:30. In the year they were working next door we didn't receive any noise complaints from our guests. We even had the crew over for breakfast to express our appreciation.

So, a little more work to do and they will be done. The owner wants to have the home included on the Amelia Island Museum of History Holiday Home Tour. There are several historic homes that will be open to the public on December 4th and 5th. The tour was very popular last year and all the homes will be fully decorated for Christmas. They have about three weeks left before the tour so we expect to see a lot of activity as the decorators leap into action. We are giving away tickets to the tour to our guests. Check out our website for details. Maybe you'll even get to see the inside of the house next door!

I Just Want To Bang On My Drum All Day

If any of you have an artistic or creative bent then you are going to love one of Fernandina Beach's newest nightspots. The place is ideally located right between 3rd and 4th on Center Street, just around the corner from the Green Turtle and practically next door to O'Kane's Irish Bar. Indigo Alley (http://www.indigo-alley.com/) used to be the Cigars and Guitars shop. Then they rented out the ex-bar next door, broke through the wall between the two shops and now have Indigo Alley. Personally, I think "Cigars, Guitars and a Bar" would have been a better name but you should hear what I thought of renaming the Addison when we bought it.

Indigo Alley's bartender is also their dance instructor and the man clearly has a passion for dance. The give lessons 3 nights a week with Swing, Salsa and Latin rotating the Schedule. They have live music most nights and usually have something else happening.

Wednesday is "Sew and Sip" with people sewing and drinking. From a safety point of view I'm not certain that alcohol and needles are a good mix but these people are probably trained professionals. Do not try this at home!

Monday night hosts something completely different... a Drum Circle. We have had guests with drum experience go to the circle and come back with great stories about the group so we thought we'd give it a try last Monday. How many different ways can you spell "mistake"? I have absolutely no rhythm. My family has pretty much decided that I shouldn't dance in public and if you give me a drum and a stick and I will bang away like a monkey with the DTs. The rest of the people in the circle were good at what they do and were willing to share drums and things started off well but deteriorated rapidly. Twenty minutes later we left the Circle and sat at the bar where we belonged.

The next time you are staying with us you really have to check this place out. We've been there a few times for the live music and, with the embarrassing Drum Circle experience excepted, it is a nice little spot that we have really enjoyed.

Sorry, no photos in this posting. If you follow the link above you will find some great pics as well as a schedule of upcoming events. Do you notice how people in the Drum Circle picture look like they are really having a good time? That was taken before we got there.

Fernandina Loves A Parade

It was Homecoming Weekend for the Fernandina Beach High School and I tell you this, my friend, Fernandina Beach loves a parade. This one kind of caught me by surprise. Maggie Doone, One-Eye Louie and myself were at the Turtle enjoying a bowl of Nori's soup when we heard about it. We skittled back to the inn just in time to see the fire trucks and police escort roll by the front porch.

There was a good sized crowd watching the parade. Many of them were small children with Hallowe'en pumpkin trick-or-treat buckets. There was a good showering of Mardi Gras beads and candy from the floats but I think the kids are going to have to wait for Hallowe'en to really fill up their buckets.

Fernandina Beach High School was playing Yulee High School for the Homecoming game. The results haven't been posted but when I know, you'll know.

The next big parade will be for Veteran's Day. The Veteran's Day parade will coincide with the opening of the new Legion building in town. The old building was a log structure with a roof that caved in so the new building has been a long time coming. The new Legion building has a big central bar / dining facility and a couple of rentable meeting rooms off to the side. They raised the 40' flag pole the other day and Artie (Artie The One Man Party, daytime bartender at the Palace Saloon and one who has served his country well) says you should be able to see the flag when you cross over the bridge onto the island. There are a lot of people on the island, myself included, who are excited to see the new building open.

That is the excitement for today. Before Veteran's Day of course, we have the Georgia Florida Football Classic weekend. The First GA/FL Great Tailgate Cookoff was delayed until next year so we at the Addison will be doing our own pre-tailgate party on Friday night for Happy Hour. I'm going to make my favorite hamburger patties, fire up the grill and get the football weekend started wih some great food. Nothing says "football fun" like a tailgate cookout. See you there!

Car Show Weekend

We are having an incredible weekend here at the Addison. We've got a full house (always good) and there is lots going on to keep everyone busy and happy. The weather is absolutely gorgeous with a high of 75 and nothing but sunshine.

We started off with cooler Fall weather on Saturday morning. I was up early and walked with Maggie Doone down Center Street. The Amelia Cruizers Car show is this weekend and they were filling up Center Street with some fantastic cars. They started late last night and we could hear them driving up all morning. Last year there were 280 cars and this year there should be a few more. This car show is my favorite local event. It is close by, it is free, and the cars have largely been restored by their owners. It is also a favorite of some of our guests and we had a few "repeat offenders", as we call them, this weekend.

We also had another wedding today in the courtyard. The first wedding service I performed was one year ago. George and Harlene were married at 1PM on Car Show Saturday and they are still married! At least that is what her friends that stayed with us a few weeks ago said. So, now we have an annual tradition... Car Show Elopement! Sign up now for next year before all of the good spots are taken!

After the wedding I took Maggie Doone and "One Eye" Louie for a walk downtown. They really liked the car show, I think mostly because people had been dropping and dripping food all over the road all day. We went to the Turtle and listened to the Face For Radio band. They were pretty good and played all afternoon. They played outside in the courtyard so we had to sit inside because Maggie just does not like the drums.

But wait, there's more! Nothing says "Festivity" in Fernandina Beach like a pair o' pirates. Arr! We ran into these two at the Turtle (sorry for the photo quality) as they drummed up support for their Blood Drive. The Blood Bus is at the end of Center Street and last year they got 86 pints for local hospitls at the car show. I'm not sure that a bar is the best place to be recruiting blood donors but I'm not a doctor, I just watch one on TV. The important thing is that everyone was having fun.

We had a good Happy Hour today, too, with almost perfect attendance. Lee modified our popular Spinach Dip by adding chopped bacon and it was great! The rest of the bacon is going on top of the Breakfast-In-A-Boat tommorrow morning.

So, the day, she winds down. As my mother says... As sand through the hourglass flow, so go the days of our lives.

Exploring Social Media

I have resisted getting a FaceBook account up until now for several reasons, the biggest being that I'm just not that into sharing every detail of my personal life with everyone on the planet. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a recluse at all. I have been blogging for years and have blogged Trip Reports for 5 years even before starting this blog. I shared travel stories, social commentary, hotel (and/or Labor Camp) reviews as well as details of the day-to-day life on the road in foreign countries. But, all through that, not many personal details.

We have made a recent move into social media as a marketing move for our inn. The multi-media mavens all say this is the way to go so away we go. The Addison now has a facebook page in hopes of communicating our message (Stay with us, please!) to a broader public. We can now share the Addison experience and information about Amelia Island with the entire planet.

The demographics of Facebook are incredible. Over 1.4 billion people have facebook accounts in 36 different languages. Facebook started off with mostly the younger set as users but the average age has crept steadily north and now 47% of Facebook users are over the age of 40. That coincides nicely with the 42 year average age of people that stay in B&Bs. Who can resist the opportunity to reach so many potential guests? Twenty years ago the average age of a B&B guest was 57. It is now 42. At the Addison we get a nice range of guest ages starting off in the low 20s and rising up to the 80s with an average probably around 40 something.

So now, after resisting the Facebook draw for years, the Addison has a Facebook page. We even have our first couple of Fans, hopefully with at least a couple more to follow. At least eight would be nice because their thumbnails would fill up that "Fans" box nicely with no blank spots. Feel free to sign up, we can all always use more friends, especially the kind that don't want you to help them move across town and need to borrow you and your truck.

I have been busy loading up content, mostly links, information and photos that just doesn't fit well onto our web site. We get lots of requests from potential guests for more photos, especially those of our courtyard, so I have been uploading elopement photos, local scenery shots and photos given to us by our guests. We frequently have guests who come to the Addison, meet other couples and leave here as friends. Besides providing a broader range of information about the Addison and Amelia Island I'm hoping that the site will give them a forum to keep in touch once they get home.

Check it out if you've got a chance. This is new to us so any feedback, especially from those of you who have Facebooked for years, would be appreciated.

Also, please note that October is a busy month for us so instead of actually doing research to come up with the "facts" and "figures" listed above I just made stuff up. I think they sound realistic. Please just don't use this posting as a "trusted source" if you're ever in front of a Grand Jury.

Break out the bubbly!

We have had great news here at the Addison this week. BedAndBreakfast.com (the industry leader in B&B directories) has announced their annual award winners and the Addison was one of the Top Ten Overall in the USA. The really cool thing about this award is that it is all based on guest comments! We received so many positive comments from so many guests that we are in the Top Ten of all the B&Bs in the US. Guest comments have also driven us to be the Number One B&B in Florida on TripAdvisor.com. So, on behalf of Shannon, Lee, myself and the Housekeeping Staff... THANK YOU for visiting us and giving us such great reviews.


We have had some really interesting guests lately, too. We even had a celebrity but we can't really say anything about her without giving it away and as my good friend Bob used to say "Discretion is my middle word". Another guest, Will, was with us for a few days and we shared foreign travel stories. After he left he sent me a picture of his time (1958) in Saudi. He was such a handome young Air Force officer back then and you can still see it in him now. Another of our recent guests was an engineer in the Apollo program. I tell you, my friends, Happy Hour has had some really interesting conversations flowing lately.


All bloggers know that you have to include a photo. Although entirely unrelated to our award, our celebrity guest or anything else I have rambled on about I present you another photo of Maggie Doone sitting at the bar at the Green Turtle. That is Maggie on the stool, Louie under the stool (he doesn't like sitting on the stools) and the hulking mass on the stool next to them is yours truly.


Balance is important in our lives. If you can find that balance between work life, social life and family life then you have the start to a happy life. If you enjoy going to work and enjoy coming home after work then you have a pretty good start. I think that Shannon and I are on that path through the good life. We both thoroughly enjoy what we do, we get along well together (25 years of marriage in November) and people we meet every day seem to be enjoying it too. To all of our guests who have stayed with us, enjoyed the experience and have posted such great comments, again THANK YOU!