Freeedom Adventures

12/12/2024

💝Great gifts. . . . Great help for local and small businesses.💛🖤
Keep funding in our country and community. 💲💵
Shop Small Business. . . .Shop Local. . . . & Shop Activities! ➡️ That means all gifts do not need to be a tangible objects. Many people would love to have something to Do, somewhere to GO, etc. Performances, museums, excursions, and, of course, TOURS! 😁❣️🎉Make Memories🥰

Freeedom Adventures offers Photo Adventures, True Crime tours, Kids Pirate Experience and Secrets of St Augustine history tour. Private Tours and Ghost tours available too!! Most tours are 90 minutes and all are walking. However special arrangements can be made.
See this link for options: https://fareharbor.com/embeds/book/freeedomphotography/?full-items=yes

12/07/2024

We come together to remember and honor the 2,403 people who lost their lives in the attack on Pearl Harbor on this day 1941. ❤️‍🩹🙏🏼

12/01/2024

Recognize this ? Such craftsmanship and beauty to be seen in this town. Get out and find it 🥰🌟

11/30/2024

Thanksgiving holiday has me thankful for all of my wonderful guests 💛🖤🧡
I’d like to start sharing some comments/reviews so that perhaps anyone contemplating a tour will know the thoughts of previous customers experiences.
🌟THANK YOU to all customers and to those taking the time to review! 💫 As a small local business it’s truly appreciated 🙌🏼🙏🏼
(This one is for Secrets of St Augustine tour)

11/28/2024

One of the many things to be thankful for is YOU!! 🙏
Blessings to you 💜

[PS: should you ever feel alone, depressed, in despair, anxious, in need. . . .please follow for encouragement, guidance and love💙🙏]

11/19/2024

💓I had the very unexpected pleasure of being able to walk the grounds of the infamous Tolomato Cemetery in St. Augustine this past weekend.🌟 I had not been planning on it and in fact did not realize this was the weekend it was open.🫣
To top it off, they were having a memorial presentation there "Patriot Remembrance Ceremony", with many people dressed in period and historical attire, and a presenting of the flags.
As a tour guide for many years and one that spends countless hours in this city let alone talking about the history of this cemetery and it's people interred there, it was a particularly thrilling event.
There will be more pictures and info to come but enjoy these views for now.
[the 3rd Saturday of the month they try to have it open if there is the man power to do so. It is on a volunteer basis]

10/31/2024

‼️📣Last Minute Bookings available!! 🧟 ⚰️🪦Between True Crime and Ghosts, what interesting tales of the past are waiting to be heard? 🤔😯
💲Through Nov 2, get tickets for only $20 each! Message for direct booking so you don't pay full price. 🤫🫠

10/28/2024

Do you notice the different materials here? And no, not talking about the loose dead grass collected in the corners lol. The Castillo de San Marcos is built out of coquina: a natural limestone type shell rock, quarried right from Anastasia island.
Back in the 1800's, when they needed to make small repairs or build something like these steps, they used the material of the day of brick. However as time went on, it is now required that only the original material be used to preserve the historical nature of this landmark.
Take a walk around this beautiful iconic structure and see how many red bricks you can find. Don't need to even go inside; a stroll around the exterior will reveal many if you look close enough.
Please take pics and then share in the comments! 😃📸

10/24/2024

There has been life on these streets in St Augustine for 459 years 😦
[Well, even longer if you consider the natives before the Spanish]
So, needless to say, that means they've seen their fair share of deaths too. 🩸💀 And not all of them 'natural'.🔪
👣Walk with me to hear some tales of murders, learn if someone was charged, and you decide if justice was done.
TORRID TALES TRUE CRIME tour.

10/22/2024

Treasury Street. . .Do you know it was named such because the treasury was located there? 🧐 Kind of a 'duh' moment. But the old Spanish City had many streets named just like that . . .named
after what was on that street. Aviles St used to be Hospital St until about a hundred years ago, as the Spanish Hospital was there. Cordova used to be Tolomato, after the village of the Tolomato, which used to be where Tolomato Cemetery is today. But I digress-

Treasury Street is also the Narrowest Street in America!! 😮 Yep, go ahead, Google it. 😏 It's narrowest spot is merely 7 feet wide, which is the far east end towards the bayfront. It was designed that way so if bandits were to try to rob the treasury, their ride could not get through quickly and they would have to run with their loot on foot, to their waiting ships. At least that's what I've been told. 🤓

10/17/2024

Who died?💀 How did they die?🧐 Who dun it?😲
If ghosts aren't necessarily your thing, perhaps true crime is.
👣Walk through the old, dark streets of historic St Augustine and hear the nitty gritty details of the who/what/where🔪🩸 and YOU decide if justice was done.🤔

10/16/2024

The Monson Hotel and Martin Luther King and Jewish Rabbis. Do you know their relation? Dr. King came to eat at the restaurant at that hotel and was promptly arrested on June 11, 1964. He spent the night at the St Johns County Jail.
A week later on June 18, 16 Rabbis were arrested on the same spot, which to this day is the largest mass arrest of rabbis in US history.
All in the struggle for civil rights.
Shortly after these events in St. Augustine, the Civil Rights Act was signed into law on July 2, 1964.

The Monson Hotel no longer exists. However, a piece of that history is revered by saving part of the steps from the Monson where those events took place. It is now the Hilton, located on the bayfront in St. Augustine. You can see these iconic steps in their drive-thru courtyard across from the front entrance.

At a ceremony in June here, commemorating this history from 60 years ago, Rabbi Merrill Shapiro said "The struggle to create a just world, is not an element of the past, but very much in the present. We need to work together, communities of diverse faith and race, to create a world of justice". . .and I'd like to add, one of harmony. ✨

10/12/2024

👀Wanting something fun and different to do this spooky season? 👻😱 Lots of options from True Crime tours🔪, Photo Adventures📸, private tours that can combine what you want or add ghost/haunting spots👻, even Kids Pirate learning tour🏴‍☠️.
Come check it out! 🤩

https://fareharbor.com/embeds/book/freeedomphotography/?full-items=yes

10/11/2024

📣🎉FREE CITY PARKING! . . .🤩If you will be in downtown St Augustine this weekend, enjoy free parking in the city garage as well as metered parking. Some continue into beginning of next week. . .read clip for more info

🚗 Park Free This Weekend in St. Augustine!

The City of St. Augustine is making it easier for residents and visitors to explore the Historic Downtown area by suspending parking fees through the weekend! From now until Sunday, enjoy free parking at the Historic Downtown Parking Facility and all city-metered areas, including on-street spaces and parking lots.

Important reminder: On Monday, October 14, parking enforcement will resume at 7:00 a.m. at the Historic Downtown Parking Facility. However, in observance of Columbus Day, parking will remain free in all city-metered areas, including on-street spaces and lots. Additionally, due to the impacts of Hurricane Milton, parking at the Castillo de San Marcos National Monument will also be free on Monday.

Starting Tuesday, October 15, regular parking enforcement will be back in effect, so be sure to check if you're parked in a city lot and avoid private operators with strict towing policies. Parking violations, especially in loading zones or against yellow curbs, will still be enforced.

The city encourages everyone to support local businesses during this recovery period by taking advantage of this temporary suspension of parking fees.

Find out more: https://bit.ly/3oQg0om

Which downtown spots are you planning to visit this weekend?

10/10/2024

3 weeks from today is the BIG day. . . HALLOWEEN. 💀 Are you getting yourself in the dark and haunted mood? 💀 You can book a true crime tour or a private tour that includes ghost stories and haunting info.
Come walk with me in St Augustine's dark streets.

{see booking link in comments 👇for options}

09/27/2024

DID YOU KNOW?? 🤔 Before the Ponce de Leon Hotel (aka Flagler College now) was built, do you think that location was bare land, empty of structures? We are talking 1886 when Flagler wanted to build and that area was swampy land (at the end of Maria Sanchez Creek) and orange groves. And it was outside the walled city parameters that existed not too long before.

Well, if you did think that, you would be mistaken.
SUNNYSIDE HOTEL. (below) Captain Thomas House built a house for his family, naming it Sunnyside House, in 1876. Shortly afterwards, he decided to open it to the public as a hotel. Rooms booked for $2.50 each.
When Henry Flagler came along, he thought a hotel here was a wonderful idea. But he wanted that location. And of course, Henry Flagler usually got what he wanted. 😏 He also thought he could 'do better'.
BUT, Henry did have interests in architecture and tried to preserve as much as he could. So when he bought out the Sunnyside Hotel, he did not destroy it. He chose to move it. . . .across the street where the Casa Monica stands today. He solicited his friend Franklin Smith (who's personal home was what is now Villa Zorayda on King St too) to run the Sunnyside Hotel in it's new location. This happened in Dec of 1886.
(Ponce de Leon opened in winter of 1888)

Well Franklin also saw bigger potential too and decided to build his own hotel as well, so once again Sunnyside was on the move.
However, this time, the house/hotel was broken up into four separate buildings, which were scattered around St. Augustine.

Franklin Smith's new hotel venture was the Casa Monica, on the same grounds it stands today (it has gone through name and purpose changes like many things, but is back to it's original name and grandeur now)
The sections of Sunnyside are mostly gone now EXCEPT for ONE. It is at 525 W. King St, as the St John's Housing Partnership.
In 2001, it became the very FIRST official Historic Landmark named in St. Johns county, as being the oldest wooden hotel still standing pre-dating the Flagler era.