North Americans have a rich bounty of shipwrecks along the reefs and shoals of the continent. Here is a sampler of easily accessible dives.

Florida Keys Shipwreck Heritage Trail

Florida Keys Shipwreck Heritage Trail. Divers and snorkelers can explore nine wrecks from Key Largo to Key West, lying in 20 to 140 feet of water. Many dote on the oldest wreck, the San Pedro, a member of the 1733 Spanish treasure fleet. It’s off Islamorada’s Indian Key in just 18 feet of water. Dives are usually less than $100 including gear. 800-352-5397; fla-keys.com.

James Bond, Thuderball, Plane Wreck

The famous James Bond wreck is in Nassau, Bahamas. Divers can see two wrecks used in Thunderball and Never Say Never Again, an old World War II landing craft, decorated with fire coral, sponges, and sea fans, and the steel skeleton of a Vulcan bomber aircraft. Dives are usually less than $150 including gear. 242-302-2000; bahamas.com .

The Royal Mail Steamer Rhone Shipwreck

The Royal Mail Steamer Rhone is the grand dive of the British Virgin Islands, off Salt Island. The ship, which went down in an 1867 hurricane, lies on a reef in 20 to 80 feet of water. It’s now encrusted with corals and sponges, and world-famous from its starring role in the film The Deep, with Jacqueline Bisset. Dives are generally less than $150 including gear. 800-835-8530; b-v-i.com.

Barbados’ Carlisle Bay Shipwrecks

Barbados’ Carlisle Bay is clogged with at least four wrecks, all close to shore. The Berwind is an easy dive, a French tug sunk in 1919, now in about 25 feet of water. Blowfish, trumpet fish, and lizard fish make the wreck home. 800-221-9831; barbados.org.

Besides the Herman H. Hettler, Smith Moore, and The Manhattan, many other wrecks lie off Au Sable Reef in Pictured Rock National Lakeshore, Lake Superior. Shipwreck Tours of Munising leads dive charters out to two wrecks, at $75 per person for a two-tank dive. Landlubbers can glide above three turn-of-the-century wooden ships, the Bermuda, the Hettler, and a mystery wreck as yet unidentified, in the company’s glass-bottom boat for $30, $12 for children 12 and younger. 906-387-5456; shipwrecktours.com.

Stay Dry in the Museums

For those who don’t like to get their feet wet, here are some great rescued wrecks and artifacts around the world.

Florida Keys History of Diving Museum in Islamorada covers every inch of dive history, from the heavy lead boots to the shiny metal helmets of early diving. Take a snapshot of the earliest underwater cameras. The museum is open daily 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Ticket price is $12 per adult, $11 per seniors, $6 per child 5-12 and free for children younger than 5. 305-664-9737; divingmuseum.org.

Mel Fisher Maritime Museum, Key West, holds one of the world’s great Spanish sunken treasures raised to the surface. For more than 15 years, Fisher, his family and his team searched for the Spanish galleons Atocha and Santa Margarita, royal treasure ships that went down in a hurricane in 1622 en route from Cuba to Spain. They found millions in emeralds, coins and gold bars, on display in Key West. The museum is open daily 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Fri., 9:30 a.m.-5 p.m. weekends and holidays. Ticket price is $12 per adult; $10.50 per student, and $6 per child. 305-294-2633; melfisher.org.

Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute covers the waterfront from the island’s pink sand to the bottom of the ocean floor. This is the place to try on scuba gear and take a simulated dive in a Nautilus X2 submersible—and survive an attack by a giant squid. Science is fun in this museum, which also has a Shipwreck Gallery, with centuries of recovered artifacts, and a Treasure Room with Spanish gold and pirate booty. The museum is open daily except Christmas, 9 a.m.- 5 p.m. Mon.-Fri., 10 a.m.-5 p.m. weekends. Ticket price is $12.50 per adult, $10 per senior, $6 per child 6-17, and free for children younger than 5. 441-292-7219; buei.org.

Mary Rose, King Henry VIII’s favorite warship, is awaiting her new $59 million museum in 2012 in Portsmouth, England. In the meantime, scores of artifacts brought up from the wreck are on display at the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. See what Tudor tankards looked like, and the tools that the ship’s barber/physician used on the crew. The Mary Rose, built between 1509 and 1511, served proudly in King Henry’s wars, and was on her way out of Portsmouth harbor in 1545 to fight the French once again when she sank. Not until 1966 did scuba diver Alexander McKee locate the wreck in near-zero visibility. The hull was raised in 1982, and has been undergoing hydration preservation ever since. Portsmouth Historic Dockyard is open 10 a.m. daily except Dec. 24, 25 and 26; from April-October, last tickets to the attractions are sold at 4.30 p.m. and the Dockyard gates are closed at 6 p.m. From November-March, last tickets to the attractions are sold at 4 p.m. and the Dockyard gates are closed at 5.30 p.m. Ticket price for all six Dockyard attractions is $31 per adult, $26 per senior, and $22 per student and child 5-15. 44-023- 9272-8060; maryrose.org

The Vasa Museum in Stockholm is Scandinavia’s most-visited, a vast space that spotlights the world’s only surviving 17th-century ship. King Gustav II Adolf commissioned the mighty warship, which was launched in 1627. On her maiden voyage in Stockholm harbor, the Vasa heeled over and sank. In 1956, divers raised the foremast; they brought the bulk of the ship to the surface in 1961. “Face to Face” is one of the museum’s most moving exhibits, with personae created from the wreck’s 15 unidentified skeletons telling their stories from Aug. 10, 1628, the day the Vasa sank. The museum is open daily 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., until 8 p.m. on select Wednesdays. Ticket price is $16 per adult, free for children 18 and younger. 46-8-519 548 00; vasamuseet.se/en.

Diver Betsa Marsh has explored shipwrecks from the Great Lakes and Caribbean to Polynesia and Micronesia.

Dive In! The Saturday Evening Post

Tonight Reuben and I linger in the kitchen longer than usual. It’s August in Tampa, maybe the hottest day of 
the year; we’re both reluctant to leave the air conditioning. Finally we join Ted and Carolyn on the porch. They’re 
sitting in their usual spots on the wicker sofa, red-faced 
from laughing.

“What’s so funny?” says Reuben.

Carolyn wipes a tear from her eye. “I can’t say.” She gives me a wink. “There’s a lady present.”

Carolyn’s stories are usually bawdy or scatological, 
full of burps and farts and bodily emissions. She has the vocabulary of a trucker or a sailor. Reuben and I joke that we get together so Ted and Carolyn can curse. It feels good to joke about it. It reassures me that my jealousy of Carolyn is in remission. For a long time it consumed me. From the day he met her, Ted became more critical of me: my fears, my shyness, the time I spend in the bathroom putting 
on makeup or taking it off. He never complained about those things before. Not until Carolyn reminded him of everything I wasn’t.

“How’ve you been, Ted?” says Reuben, offering his hand. “Did Carolyn tell you what happened yesterday?”

“What?” says Ted.

“Get this,” she says. “Yesterday I had my first cutaway with a student.”

Carolyn works part-time as a skydiving instructor. Every weekend she does a dozen tandem dives with novice divers strapped to her belly. I listen as she explains how yesterday, diving with an exceptionally nervous student, she realized that their shared parachute had failed to open.

“Twenty seconds,” she says, pausing for effect. “I had 20 seconds to cut loose the chute and open the safety. Otherwise—” she claps her hands together. “Splat.”

“Cut it loose?” I say.

“When the chute opens there’s a whole mess of ropes,” Ted explains. “If you don’t cut it loose, the second chute will get tangled up in them. Then you’re cooked.”

I feel suddenly queasy. I have a desperate fear of heights; the thought of jumping out of an airplane makes me sick. Reuben puts his hands over my ears.

“Poor Nora,” he says. “Don’t listen. You’ll have nightmares.”

There’s more to the story—the intricacies of packing a parachute; comparisons to Carolyn’s two previous cutaways, both on solo dives—but I’m not listening. I’m watching Ted watch her. His blue eyes flash, and a spot of red appears in each cheek. It occurs to me, not for the first time, that this is why I keep inviting Reuben and Carolyn back. My husband is never more interesting to me than when we’re in Carolyn’s presence. Years ago—I’m not sure of this, but I think it’s true—he watched me that way. Every night he came into the restaurant where I worked and sat at the bar for hours, nursing a single beer. The stalker, my friends called him. Twelve years later his eyes skim over me; I am like a familiar painting, like the house he grew 
up in. I look at him the same way. Only when Carolyn comes do I notice his clean profile, his resonant voice, his wrists turning in the cuffs of his shirt. I remember that my husband is a handsome man.

We met Reuben and Carolyn two years ago, in a Thai restaurant on Dale Mabry Highway. We sat on opposite sides of the room; between us, a table of young men celebrated a birthday. The men toasted, laughed, drank. They wore stylish sweaters; they sang “Happy Birthday” in resonant tenors. Then, halfway through their meal, the birthday boy pitched face forward into his curry. An ambulance arrived. Just as the man was carried out on a stretcher, a waiter came out of the kitchen balancing two trays: Carolyn and Reuben’s pad thai, Ted’s and my yellow curries.

“We’re game if you are,” Carolyn called across the room. “We’re both organ donors, by the way.” We laughed, Reuben ordered a round of Korean beers, and by the end of the night they’d moved to our table. They fascinated me, the silver-haired gentleman and his young wife, her hair so short that a waiter had once called her “Sir,” even though she and Reuben were holding hands at the time. We all laughed when Reuben told this story, though later the whole thing struck me as strange. Carolyn is tall and slender, with delicate features; it seemed impossible that anyone could mistake her for a man. Stranger still, neither Carolyn nor Reuben seemed bothered by the waiter’s comment. This, I’ve since concluded, is the difference between them and us. In Carolyn’s place I would have been mortified. In Reuben’s place—having a stranger think he was sharing a romantic dinner with another man—Ted would have been livid.

At the end of the evening we swapped phone numbers. “We’ll never see them again,” I told Ted; but a few days later, Reuben called, inviting us to their house for a barbecue. We played badminton in their yard that evening, slightly drunk: Ted and I on one side of the net, Reuben and Carolyn on the other. After 10 minutes Reuben and I put down our racquets and stood off to the side swapping recipes for bouillabaisse. Finally we retired to the patio, watching Ted and Carolyn as we talked. They played until full dark, visible only by their white tennis shorts, their long bodies graceful as dragonflies.

They are alike in more ways than I can count. They both love dogs, action movies, college football; they are both skiers, scuba divers, climbers of rocks. From a distance they even look alike: blond hair, muscled calves, sinewy forearms. To me they are like champion horses, beautiful because of their strength.

The Florida evening is loud with bugs, the neighborhood coming back to life after the shuttered, sultry afternoon. There are katydids, dogs barking, kids playing baseball in 
the park down the street. We hear a loud crack, the satisfying collision 
of bat and ball.

“Good hit,” says Carolyn. “Sounds like a homer.”

Ted rolls his eyes. “I wish they’d go back to school already. Ask Nora. They make me nuts.”

I shrug. “They make him nuts.”

Reuben and Carolyn don’t have children either. For them the choice was easy, according to Ted; for us it’s been a struggle, a decision made after years of persuasion (his) and regrets (mine). Ted says Carolyn has no interest in babies, that she’d rather spend her best years rock climbing and skydiving than potty training and watching cartoons, and I know this only makes him love her more.

They agree on everything. The best scuba spots (the North Wall of Grand Cayman), the best way to catch a hammerhead (live blue runners), the best autumn marathon (Marine Corps; they trained together last summer). At least once in the course of the evening, they’ll say the same thing at precisely the same time. “In stereo,” Reuben will joke when it happens. I’ll laugh along with everyone else, relieved that the moment has passed.

“How are the mosquitoes treating you?” I ask. I’ve already shooed two away from my face. As the sun sinks lower, it’s only going to get worse.

“So far, so good,” says Carolyn, oblivious to the pink welt rising on her cheek.

Ted shrugs. “You know me.”

I do. Ted grew up in Florida, yet he’s never felt a mosquito bite in his life. He’s always surprised the next morning to find his arms and legs covered with red bumps. He has climbed Mt. McKinley, run four marathons, and dives to depths of 140 feet, yet he’s unaware of certain facts about his body: that he’s allergic to cats, that red peppers give him heartburn, that his arms become more freckled every year from not wearing sunscreen. He can’t tell when he’s dehydrated, constipated, or catching a cold. He doesn’t realize he’s losing his hair.

“My potatoes are boiling,” I say, getting up. “Any volunteers to make a salad?” We’re having shark steaks, from the 5-foot hammerhead Ted caught in the Keys last weekend, and his favorite garlic mashed potatoes. Ted does the catching, cleaning, and grilling. I do everything else.

“Sure,” says Reuben.

“We’ll take Buck to the park,” 
says Ted. “I’ll start the grill when 
I get back.”

Reuben follows me inside. I mix the salad dressing; he takes a head of romaine from the refrigerator 
and rinses it at the sink. We don’t talk much, but I admire the way 
he moves around my kitchen, humming softly. His forearms are tanned from the golf course. Everything about him murmurs gentleness and competence.

“We have good news tonight,” 
he says, reaching into the cupboard for a bowl. “I’m retiring. I resigned last week.”

For a moment I’m speechless, stunned by the thought that I’m old enough to have a friend who’s retired. I’ve never asked Reuben’s age, but I know he’s got 20 years on the rest of us, maybe more.

“Wow,” I say. “Congratulations.”

“I’ve been thinking about it for awhile.” He tears the lettuce into the bowl. “Don’t get me wrong. I love my work.” For nine years he’s been president of First Florida Bank. “But I’d like to be home for dinner once in awhile. I’d like to spend a little time with my wife.”

“She must be thrilled.”

Reuben chuckles. “I think she’s a little worried. I’ve been a workaholic since she met me. She’s afraid I’ll 
lose my mind.”

“You can travel. Play golf. You’ll find plenty to do.”

“I think so.” He looks up from 
the salad. “I’ve got one project 
lined up already.”

He’s about to say more when we hear Ted clattering up the porch stairs. He takes a glass from the drainer and fills it with water.

“You’re bleeding,” I tell him.

“Am I?” Ted looks at his legs. A bright string of blood is trickling down his blond shin; Buck must have tried to climb him, crazy to get the frisbee out of his grasp. He swipes the blood away with his sweaty forearm, then takes the glass out to the porch.

Reuben laughs. I wonder if he’s thinking what I’m thinking: How 
can a person not know he’s bleeding? It gets back to the question I’ve always had about Ted: Is he brave because he fears nothing, or because he feels nothing?

A moment later Carolyn comes into the kitchen, her T-shirt plastered to her sweaty back. Her hair is sticking straight up and there’s a smear of dirt on her face. She looks terrific. I think of my family’s medicine chest when I was a little girl: the ointments and laxatives, the ovals of pink felt for the bony joint of my mother’s big toe, sore and swollen from years of stuffing her wide, flat feet into dainty pumps. Carolyn’s medicine chest would contain no evidence of the sad, secret maintenance a woman’s body requires: the depilatories and mustache bleaches, the yeast treatment creams, the Midol. I know this is true because I’ve checked.

“Nora, that’s one hell of a dog you’ve got,” she says, rinsing 
her hands under the faucet. “He’s 
a champ.”

I smile. “He says the same about you.” Naturally, Buck loves Carolyn. She grew up on a dog ranch in northern Minnesota with a father who bred huskies and raced dogsleds. I wonder if that cold childhood is responsible for her fast metabolism, her miraculous pink-and-white-skin.

She watches me drain the boiled potatoes into the sink. “Can I help?”

“Can you peel potatoes?”

She frowns. “How tough can it be?”

Reuben laughs. “I’ll be out on the porch,” he says. 
“Nora, keep her away from the stove. And don’t let her
 chop anything.”

On the climbing wall Carolyn can balance her entire weight on one toe and four fingers, so graceful it hurts to watch her. In the kitchen she’s like a teenage boy, all 
knees and elbows. I stand next to her at the sink and 
show her how the skins slip right off when the potatoes 
are cooked long enough.

“Will you look at that?” she marvels, as if I’ve demonstrated an ability to move objects with my mind. She digs into a potato with her fingers and laughs delightedly as the skin peels away. “Where did you learn this?”

“I’m an Irish girl. I was peeling potatoes before I could walk.” I cut the potato into quarters. “My mother could peel a dozen a minute.”

Carolyn whistles through her teeth. “Geez. I don’t know any of this stuff.” She reaches for another potato. “You can do anything.”

A flush warms my face. Like all redheads I have treacherous skin, the kind that hides nothing. “You’re joking.”

“No, really.” Carolyn touches my arm. “You’re like an Amish woman. You make all this amazing food, and you don’t even have a microwave.”

I laugh out loud. “You’re too much.” I set down my knife and do something I’ve never done before: I give Carolyn a hug. She’s a foot taller than I am; I stand on my toes to grasp her shoulders. She smells of soap and grass and chewing gum, like a little girl.

The screen door slams; we hear Ted’s whistle, his heavy footfalls. Carolyn releases me, like a teenage brother too embarrassed to touch. Ted comes into the kitchen carrying a couple of empties.

He says, “Did Carolyn really peel a potato?”

We eat on the screened porch. Carolyn tells another story, and Reuben raves about the fresh artichokes. Ted keeps our glasses filled.

“I talked to the travel agent,” says Ted. “She found us 
a terrific condo on Cayman Brac, but we have to reserve 
this week.”

Carolyn glances at me. “I’m not sure we should drag these guys on another dive trip.”

“Nora doesn’t mind,” says Ted.

Our last time in the Caymans, Ted and Carolyn did 14 dives in 10 days. I spent every afternoon drinking margaritas in the tiki bar with Reuben. It wasn’t a bad trip.

Ted clears the plates from the 
table. Reuben and I each left some potatoes; Ted’s and Carolyn’s plates are as clean as if they’ve licked 
them. He takes the leftovers down 
the porch stairs and whistles for the dog. Reuben leans back in his chair and smokes a cigar. He and Carolyn hold hands under the table. That’s something kids do, something Ted 
and I used to do, so long ago I can’t remember what it felt like.

I turn to Carolyn. “I heard the 
news. Reuben already told me. You must be thrilled.”

Carolyn looks at Reuben, confused. “News?” she repeats.

I refill my wine glass. “About his retirement.”

Carolyn laughs. “Oh, that good news.” She runs a hand through her hair. “Yeah, it’s great. Two more weeks and he’s a free man.”

We have coffee and dessert on the porch; Reuben helps me clear the cups and plates. When I come back outside Carolyn is leaning over the railing, staring into the distance. Ted has his back to us, his fingers in a pot of saguaro cactus, checking to see if it needs water.

“Climbing in the morning?” he asks. “6:30?”

“Me?” says Carolyn.

“Of course,” says Ted. “Who else?”

He’s right—neither Reuben nor I would be caught dead rock climbing—but the remark comes out sarcastic and a little cruel.

“Sure,” says Carolyn. “I’ll meet you at the wall.”

At 11:00 p.m., Reuben and Carolyn get up to leave. We walk them down the porch steps to their Jeep. Reuben’s arm is around Carolyn’s waist and they stumble slightly, trying to walk side by side down the narrow stairs. For a second I feel Ted’s hand at the small of my back. Then it goes away so quickly I wonder if I imagined it.

“I have to tell you guys something,” she says. “I’m going to burst.” She turns to me. “We’re adopting a baby girl from Romania. She’s not coming for another three weeks, but I couldn’t wait.” She grabs my hand, not Ted’s. “I wanted you to be the first to know.”

Baby. I remember a time, months ago, when I ran into Carolyn in my gynecologist’s waiting room. It surprised me, then, that Carolyn would need such a doctor; that she possessed the same invisible network of tubes and organs I did. Equipment we’d both opted—I thought—not to use. She’s been trying all along, I think. Trying to have a baby.

“A baby,” I say. For the second 
time that night I take her in my arms. “A baby.”

I can imagine her as a mother. I’ve seen the transformation before, ambitious friends who quit their jobs in advertising or finance; glamorous friends who cut their hair and began wearing sweat suits. Somehow on Carolyn motherhood will look different, a breathtaking feat.

Ted won’t see Carolyn for a couple of months. Week after week she’ll break their climbing date. “She’s busy with the baby,” I’ll tell him; but he’ll be dejected, inconsolable, like Buck when we leave for a weekend and put him in the kennel. When Reuben and Carolyn finally invite us to their place, Ted will bring gifts he picked out himself: a miniature fishing vest, a GoreTex windbreaker. “It’s technical,” he’ll say of the windbreaker, as though the baby might find herself in a rainy wilderness where hypothermia was a danger. Carolyn will exclaim over the tiny clothes, but she’ll fold them and put them back in their boxes, and Ted will know that he has lost her.

Ted doesn’t know any of this now, but he suspects. I feel it in his body, his arm creeping around my waist. Together we watch the Jeep back out of the driveway. Carolyn drives one-handed, her left arm hanging out the window. We stand in the yard a long time, until the red taillights disappear at the end of the street.

Cutaway The Saturday Evening Post

You can see more images by viewing our gallery. You can also check out our first installment, America’s Best Botanical Gardens, Part 1: The West

The South

Wikimedia Commons

Atlanta Botanical Garden (Georgia) Most gardens ask visitors not to step in flowerbeds. In the Atlanta Botanical Garden, they warn you. This is because it has one of the largest carnivorous plant collections around, making it a place where guests with poor manners learn the hard way. In reality, these plants are no threat to anything larger than a bug (or the occasional mouse or frog), but they are very cool. They capture prey in a variety of ways- from snapping shut to pitfall traps- and fascinate visitors of all ages. There are of course other attractions, like the Rose, Rock, and Southern Seasons gardens. The Fuqua Orchid Center houses lots of the flowers, and the Center for Conservation and Education does just that. For a special treat, visit after dark. www.atlantabotanicalgarden.org

Courtesy Fairchild Botanical Gardens

Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden (Florida) Florida is home to the greatest tropical plant center in mainland U.S.- the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden (FTBG). Named for David Fairchild, who traveled every habitable continent studying plants, it is a global conservation leader. FTBG’s 83 acres harbor over 4,000 plant species. Thematic areas include the National Palm Collection (the world’s greatest living collection of palms and cycads), Simons Rainforest, and Whitman Tropical Fruit Pavilion. Events like the Chocolate, Orchid and International Mango festivals add to the appeal. FTBG’s conservation efforts extend beyond its grounds. It oversees research, development and renovation projects in over 20 countries. More than 150 classes are taught here, including graduate courses for tomorrow’s conservationists. www.fairchildgarden.org

Courtesy of the Dallas Arboretum

Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden (Texas) Plants have unique challenges in North Texas – searing summer heat; severe winter temperature drops; drought possibility all year. The Dallas Arboretum (DA) meets this climatic challenge, maintaining a model in regional gardening excellence. The garden’s relative youth (founded 1982) has been key in its success. Planners used modern information to select flora that endure and thrive in the harsh conditions. Today, DA is a leader in climate-specific plant knowledge and operates trial gardens to provide private plant companies info. In spring, DA puts on two signature events. In “Dallas Blooms,” 500,000 bulbs create the South’s largest floral display. In Artscape, artists show photos, jewelry, woodwork, and more. www.dallasarboretum.org

The Northeast

Photo by T. Kates / Courtesy of The Trustees of Reservations

Mytoi Gardens (Massachusetts) Located in Martha’s Vineyard, one of the most scenic locales in the U.S., the Mytoi Gardens are a sight to behold. Here, the pristine beauty of the Massachusetts coastal island seems to be captured and amplified with a Japanese twist. Guests enjoy tranquility and self-reflection during their visit to Mytoi, which includes a camellia dell, stone garden, and pine grove. All of these center around the signature feature: a reflection pond and island accessible by elevated bridge. Mytoi is free to the public, making it an easily accessible and affordable item on any Martha’s Vineyard travel itinerary. A hurricane destroyed much of it in 1991, and the Trustees of Reservations charitable organization has restored and maintained it for everyone since. www.thetrustees.org/places-to-visit/cape-cod-islands/mytoi.html

(Wikimedia Commons)

Brooklyn Botanical Garden (New York) This 52-acre “living museum,” located smack dab in the middle of Brooklyn, makes visitors rethink what an “urban jungle” is. Over 700,000 come annually to see the Brooklyn Botanical Garden, which celebrates its centennial in 2010 and is home to 11,000 plant species and several specialty areas. The cherry orchard is a famed destination during Hanami, the Japanese holiday for cherry-blossom season. An enchanting landscape takes center stage during this event- hundreds of  cherry trees bloom overhead and millions of fallen petals carpet the path below- while Japanese culture is shared with all. Other thematic areas include a Rose Garden, Conservatory, and Fragrance Garden. Year round art shows, tours and plant sales, and programs like the Chili Pepper Fiesta and Street Tree Stewardship Initiative, make this botanical garden world-class. www.bbg.org

America’s Best Botanical Gardens, Part 2: The South and Northeast The Saturday Evening Post

Ageless St. Augustine Bonus
(Bonus material from “Ageless St. Augustine,” in the Jan/Feb 2010 issue of The Saturday Evening Post. Click here to subscribe or buy the issue online at ShopThePost.com.)

The Kessler calamari at 95 Cordova in the Casa Monica Hotel is so popular that the restaurant plans to sell it in go-cups for travelers wandering the streets. Even nonsquid lovers fall for this semolina-crusted version, served with a Moroccan pesto of sweet olives, tomatoes, and asiago cheese. “We haven’t convinced them to let us walk and drink here like you can in New Orleans and Key West,” said Casa Monica’s Joni Dooley Barkley, “but we can walk and eat.”

For dessert, there’s Key Lime Pie in every possible permutation, but for my calories, I’ll take Claude’s Chocolate. Former New Yorkers Claude Franques and his wife, Nicole, have gotten into the Southern groove, making little white chocolate mimosas, flavored with orange and champagne, and pandering to University of Florida fans with dark chocolate gators.

However, there are scarier things than gators in St. Augustine. All you need to feel a chill up your spine is to eavesdrop on the locals. The Casa Monica Hotel and adjoining condos were built on an old Indian burial ground, they say, and were so haunted that the new owners called in ghostbusters from England.

Henry Flagler, the Standard Oil magnate who transformed Florida with grandiose hotels and railroads, died in 1913 and was lying in state in the rotunda of the building that is now his namesake college. Local legend holds that during the service, the casket lid slammed down, a puff of smoke flew up to the top of the dome, flashed down like lightning and seared a portrait of the man himself in one of the inch-square floor tiles. Just ask a local where to look in this sea of mosaics.

The St. Augustine Lighthouse, recently restored, has its own tales to tell. It’s a huff-and-puff climb up 219 stairs. (Just imagine being a keeper carrying 30-pound buckets of hot pig lard up to fuel the flame.)

Tragically, three little girls were killed during the lighthouse construction when they hopped into a railroad car for a ride and couldn’t stop it before it dumped them into the waves.

In the 136 years since, ghosts seem to have stacked up upon themselves at the lighthouse. When the SciFi Channel’s Ghost Hunters came to tape, they saw faces leaning over the stair landings and tracked plenty of psychic activity.

But you can hardly blame spirits for haunting St. Augustine. I didn’t want to leave either.

To make the most out of your St. Augustine getaway, check out the links below.

Art Galleries
Attractions
Bed and Breakfast Inns
Campgrounds
Events
Hotels

St. Augustine Travel Tips The Saturday Evening Post