Common Ground Tour - Waterfront

Apalachacola View

On the second day of the tour we drove south from Monticello, FL down through the small town of Panacea to the Gulf Coast.  The state of Florida has nicknamed it's coastal regions. For instance the Jacksonville area is the First Coast, Palm Beach is the Gold Coast,  Pensacola is the Emerald Coast. The Florida shoreline we drove, from St Marks to Mexico City is called the Forgotten Coast.  It is SD's and my's favorite. As the name suggests, it's a relatively forgotten and ignored part of Florida and it's beautiful. White sandy beaches, pine and palm forests, salt marshes, birds, even black bears.

As we drove further west, back into more 'remembered' coasts, we were thinking about other coasts, Floridian, Atlantic, Pacific, even lakes and streams.  It it's clear that Americans love their coasts. They love it in different ways, and show that love differently but it's where American's go when they want to enjoy themselves.

One of S.D.'s oft repeated statistic is that "the population of the U.S. has doubled in his

Coastline - St. Joe's State Park, FL

lifetime and a higher percentage now live on the coastline. Which means the populaion has more than doubled on the coast."  Thus there are a lot of people living on the coast. There are a lot of people vacationing there too.  Any coastal area parking lot will have cars from multiple states. Here on the Gulf the majority of out of state plates are from the midwest.  In Florida there were from the northeast.  On the pacific coast they were from Nevada, Idaho and Arizona.

Contast that to recreation areas mid-country where unless you're on an interstate, it's only locals. It's the coastal areas that are the gathering spots. The places where American's from all over the country get together,  live, relax, have fun, and maybe, just maybe get out of their own bubbles and get to know one another a little better.