Palatka
This small City can be found around 25 miles south west of St Augustine, and its name comes from the Timucuan word Pilotakata, which means crossing, as it crosses the St John’s River.
Palatka was formed in 1821 as a trading post and was known as the “Gem of St Johns”.
The City quickly grew because of its supply of timber and citrus. It’s natural beauty also attracted visitors and several world class hotels were built.
Unfortunately, a fire downtown destroyed many buildings and together with the freezes in 1894 and 1895 the popularity declined.
We took a trip here to visit the Ravine Gardens State Park, which is a 59 acre & nearly 3-mile driveway (or walk) around a ravine that is as deep as 120 feet in some places. It was created naturally over thousands of years by water flowing through from the St Johns River, cutting through the sandy ridges.
In the early 1930’s gardens were created by local citizens and the City, together with other government agencies and the area was planted with over 64 varieties of azaleas, totaling 95,000 plants! Together with 11,000 palm trees and 250,000 ornamental plants this was quite some project!
The gardens don’t look as grand as they once were, mostly due to hurricanes and maintenance, but it is still an amazing spectacle. Ravine Gardens is the only State Park with a formal design landscape, and it has many rock gardens and terraces. There are a few bridges too, to cross the ravine in places. Near to the Park entrance is a 64-foot obelisk dedicated to President Franklin D Roosevelt, and a “Court of States”.
When we drove back through Palatka we stopped to look at the murals on some of the buildings and we also found a neat looking diner on Reid St that we’d like to visit.
We definitely want to come back and will update this blog – apparently there’s a nice riverfront park and I’d like to visit some more of the murals and buildings.
The City of Palatka’s address is 201 N. 2nd Street, Palatka, FL 32177