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Punta Gorda and El Jobean

11 hours ago
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Ponce de Leon statue and Gilchrist Bridge

We went out to El Jobean and Punta Gorda today so I could take some shots. Our last stop was Gilchrist Park, where you'd find the Ponce de Leon monument featured above.

First we headed out to El Jobean to locate the El Jobean Cemetery as described on the website, but it was baffling that the area is full of housing and overgrown woods. The plats that we suspected were very uneven and overgrown with vegetation. Shouldn't a cemetery that was active as recently as 1966 be marked and maintained? After that frustration, it was nice to actually see the old El Jobean Hotel, which is miraculously still standing, perhaps held up by the dense vegetations that's concealed its expansive walls. A visitor sees a wooden shack, not a 5,000sqft inn that was a favourite of circus folks and movie stars from the Roaring Twenties through the 1940's.

El Jobean Hotel

We went all the way over to Cleveland to photograph the Goodall-Reed House, built in 1910. The surrounding lots seemed a popular dumping site for ruined boats and broken RVs. The property was reasonably maintained with only the palms and vines overgrowing around the structure. A visitor can reasonably walk around it, but I'd recommend closed-toe shoes and long pants. Many of the windows were boarded and the front door had been broken-in and repaired with a chain and padlock.

Goodall-Reed House - side window

As mentioned above, we went to Gilchrist Park and walked along the harbor and up and down the pier in today's beautiful weather. Tommy really enjoyed the walk and the sight of the water. I've gotten around to submitting a couple new waymarks and, since we were at the Ponce de Leon monument and Gilchrist Park, I got to log visits for someone else's waymark.

I think some waymarkers forget that waymarking isn't just about posting new waymarks. It's nice to log a visit, especially in my area, because it means that someone else is taking the time to document what's interesting and important about my area. That's a very good thing.