A Great Place to Live! Fleming Island is located near Orange Park just outside of Jacksonville, Florida. It is a great place to live and offers many amenities, local area interests and activities. FlemingIslandOnline.net provides Fleming Island information including restaurants, business, golf courses, churches, schools, and area interests.
Some area interests and history or detailed below:
Jacksonville:
Water defines Jacksonville, a major commercial center for northeastern Florida and southern Georgia. One of the nation’s few north-flowing rivers, the wide St. Johns snakes through the city, and boating on the Intracoastal Waterway and swimming off Atlantic beaches beckon just 20 minutes away. Add to the mix Jacksonville’s cultural attractions, and the city is worth a stop, especially for families traveling to Orlando or other Florida playgrounds further down the coast.
The region’s summer season officially kicks off at the end of April each year with the Annual Beaches Sand Castle Contest on Jacksonville Beach, a strand also favored by fishing enthusiasts because the pier extends nearly a quarter-mile into the ocean. At the nearby Adventure Landing water park, kids spray and squirt each other at the pirate-themed Shipwreck Island, which is equipped with 200 nozzles for watery shenanigans. Tube riders catch some thrills by zipping down the Hydro Half Pipe, whose near-vertical 40-foot drop ends with a splash.
At the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens’ Kids Zone play area, little ones can ride the carousel, climb inside a child-sized squirrel habitat, and swing from “vines” like monkeys. You can also lunch next to the jaguar habitat, a popular animal given the city’s home team is the NFL Jacksonville Jaguars.
Learn about stars and galaxies at the Museum of Science & History’s planetarium. In the museum’s Kidspace, ages five and younger can float boats at the Water Table and build with blocks. The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens gets kids involved by enabling them to walk through a painting, make collages, and create their own masterpieces with a virtual paintbrush at the Cummer’s newly renovated Art Connections exhibit.
Take advantage of Jacksonville’s outdoor prospects. Little Talbot Island State Park, 20 miles from downtown Jacksonville, is one of the last undeveloped barrier islands in northeastern Florida. Along with five miles of beach, the park offers surf-fishing, swimming, canoeing, and hiking. Kathryn Abbey Hanna Park also draws fishing enthusiasts to its 60-acre freshwater lake.
At the National Park Service’s Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, explore a near-exact replica of the original 16th-century fort, examine a dugout canoe, and go on ranger-led tours of the salt marshes and dunes.
More historical sites can be found 40 miles away in St. Augustine, America’s oldest continually inhabited European community. A pass on the St. Augustine Sightseeing Train affords you access to 20 stops for up to three days. Fernandina Beach on Amelia Island, 33 miles north of Jacksonville, is known for its Victorian buildings. Learn about some of the town’s more elusive inhabitants on the 90-minute Ghost Tours of Amelia Island, a good-humored look at spooks, ghouls, and other supernatural characters.
St. Augustine Florida:
The mainland of the North American continent was first sighted by the Spanish explorer and treasure hunter Don Juan Ponce de Leon on Easter, March 27, 1513. He claimed the land for Spain and named it La Florida, meaning “Land of Flowers”. Between 1513 and 1563 the government of Spain launched six expeditions to settle Florida, but all failed. the French succeeded in establishing a fort and colony on the St. Johns River in 1564 and, in doing so, threatened Spain’s treasure fleets whic h sailed along Florida’s shoreline returning to Spain. As a result of this incursion into Florida, King Phillip II named Don Pedro Menendez de Aviles, Spain’s most experienced admiral, as governor of Florida, instructing him to explore and to colonize the territory. Menendez was also instructed to drive out any pirates or settlers from other nations, should they be found there.
When Menendez arrived off the coast of Florida, it was August 28, 1565, the Feast Day of St. Augustine. Eleven days later, he and his 600 soldiers and settlers came ashore at the site of the Timucuan Indian village of Seloy with banners flying and trumpets sounding. He hastily fortified the fledgling village and named it St. Augustine.
Utilizing brilliant military maneuvers, Menendez destroyed the French garrison on the St. Johns River and, with the help of a hurricane, also defeated the French fleet. With the coast of Florida firmly in Spanish hands, he then set to work building the town, establishing missions to the Indians for the Church, and exploring the land.
Thus, St. Augustine was founded forty-two years before the English colony at Jamestown, Virginia, and fifty-five years before the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock in Massachusetts – making it the oldest permanent European settlement on the North American continent.
Fleming Island Schools
Fleming Island Churches
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