Christine von dem Bach

new page added to Buy A Florida Vacation Home

Grayton Beach

History of Grayton Beach

The State Park of Grayton Beach is one of Florida's most popular. It boasts huge sand dunes, plentiful wildlife, meandering trails, and beautiful Western Lake, one of the several coastal sand dune lakes along Highway 30A, which runs just beyond south Walton County's beaches. Grayton Beach is peaceful with charming historical cottages intermingled with modern, present-day homes. Grayton Beach offers a great deal of opportunity of tourists looking for nature, such as canoeing, fishing, sailing, bird watching, biking, and hiking along the a 17-mile trails which parallels all seventeen miles of Highway 30A.

Parks

Grayton Beach/Deer Lake State Park
357 Main Park Road
Santa Rosa Beach, FL 32459

New Mossy Head page added to www.BuyAFloridaVacationHome.com

History of Mossy Head

The sleepy, peaceful, small town of Mossy Head is gearing up for a great deal of growth. The Blackstone development is a 1300-acre large-scale project that will create residential and commercial lots as well as needed services, municipal buildings and recreational opportunities. Roughly 3,300 homes will be built, with two-thirds of that number planned as single-family units and one-third as multi-family units. There will be almost three acres of service and retail space, nearly an acre planned for offices, a day-care center, and an eighteen-hole golf course. The first phase of Blackstone is currently under construction and should be completed around 2015.

The size and scale of the development calls for necessary infrastructure, notably sewer and water lines. Mossy Head's president of the Water Works, Tom Terrell, has been closely working with Walton County's Board of Commissioners to examine how the services might be implemented. Larry Jones, Commissioner for District Three (which includes the Mossy Head area), has the need for these services will be pressing in the immediate future. Plan details such as costs and timeframes are being examined; however, Jones expects the county to act quickly to ensure the sewer service is in place near the new industrial park before Mossy Head's new elementary school opens.

Mossy Head Elementary will be located on 20 acres donated to the Walton County School Board by the County Commissioners Board and is expected to open at the start of 2008-2009 school year. The Walton County School Board is searching for sites to build a junior-high school and senior-high school as well.

Commissioner Jones applied for and was awarded a grant by the Florida DEP for the creation of a community park in Walton County. The park will be located just behind Mossy Head's EMT station at 13170 Highway 90. The new park will include a playground with splash fountains, swing sets, a walking trail, a pavilion, picnic areas, restrooms, and a parking area.

This is just the start of Mossy Head's bright future!

page added to www.BuyAFloridaVacationHome.com

Point Washington

History of Point Washington

Point Washington began as Wesley Lumber Company's hub, one of many lumber companies that timbered the Gulf Coast forests in Florida from the late 19th century until the end of the first World War. Wesley Lumber Company consisted of a planing mill, a saw mill, and a dry kiln. Lumber was loaded on barges in Tucker Bayou by way of a dock. The wood was shipped to Pensacola, to the west, and from there to states in the north and west, as well as South America and Europe. The company owned 20 homes to house the workers and their families, and a commissary attended to the workers' needs. William Henry Wesley constructed his home close to the mill, and his family resided there from its completion during 1897 until the 1950s.

The threat of fire was constant in timber towns where everything was constructed from wood. The mill burned down three times, and was rebuilt twice. The only remnants of the Wesley Lumber Company's twelve acres today in Walton County are a few old foundations and the Wesley House itself.

Point Washinton declined and the population dispersed, but Wesley's family remained in their family home, which had already seen a great deal of family history � marriages, births, and deaths. The last Wesley died in 1953 and the house was sold with its land. The Wesley house was listed for sale again ten years later, and Lois Maxon bought it.

The Wesley house was one of the largest, if not the largest, homes in the entire area. The timber frame of the house was cut and sent down the Choctawhatchee River. The layout of the house became well-known throughout the Emerald Coast in the 1800s: two groups of two equal rooms on each of two stories, each bisected by a hallway down the middle. The house's construction fit well with Gulf-coast heat before the advent of air conditioners. The house built raised on piers which allowed air to circulate and afforded it protection from flooding when Choctawhatchee Bay or Tucker Bayou overflowed their boundaries. Porches encircled each level. Large windows on each floor permitted air to circulate throughout the house during the heat and humidity of Florida summers.

Lois Maxon re-developed the home to showcase her extensive collection of family antiques and heirlooms. Two chimneys and a partition were taken out on the first floor to create an enormous music room. A new fireplace with chimney was built onto the southern porch. New rooms were built on the back of the house by walling in the porches on each story. The bricked filling circling the house's foundation was probably added by Ms. Maxon as well; this addition makes the house look as though it contains a solid, full basement. Ms. Maxon invested in extensive landscaping about the grounds to show off the house with maximum benefit. Ms. Maxon donated the house and grounds, now named Eden, to the state to honor her deceased parents in 1968.

Moss-covered live oaks, older than Wesley Company, spread their arms over much of the lawns of Eden State Gardens. Azaleas and camellias lend colorful accent to the gardens from fall to late spring; the height of their bloom occurs through March.

New page added to www.BuyAFloridaVacationHome.com

Miramar Beach

History of Miramar Beach

Miramar Beach is located in southern Walton County on the Emerald Coast that comprises Northwest Florida. Just a few minutes from Destin, Miramar Beach starts near the scenic, meandering Gulf Drive along the Gulf of Mexico, winding past private beachfront homes and condos with breathtaking gulf-front views, as well as shops, restaurants, and a beach resort. At the juncture of Gulf Drive and Emerald Coast Parkway lies America's biggest outlet mall, Silver Sands Factory Stores, comprised of more than one hundred designer-label stores. You can shop till you drop, then kick back on a beautiful "Blue Wave" beach, of which there are many in the area. South Walton Beaches feature natural, pristine beauty, clean and pure turquoise and emerald waters, silky, sugar-white sand, and lakes near coastal sand dunes. Only a few beaches have been nationally certified as "Blue Wave," which defines stringent criteria for public education and information, conservation of wildlife habitats, public services, inter-tidal beach conditions, and water purity. Recreation around Miramar Beach is diverse and includes charter boating and sailing, kayaking, parasailing, fishing, swimming, shelling, sunning, biking, hiking, and golf. Many gift shops and antique stores dot the area. Florida Trend Magazine named seven of South Walton County's beach restaurants in the top 400 of Florida.

Northwest Florida's Emerald Coast enjoys a temperate climate year-round. State-wide, Florida receives about 50 annual inches of rainfall, making it one of the country's wettest. Florida's Panhandle receives most of that rain. Often, however, the cloudbursts end quickly and the sun is soon as bright as ever. The heat and humidity from May through September are the result of tropical winds blown north across the Gulf of Mexico. The rest of the year, most days are pleasantly warm and most evenings are pleasantly cool. The hurricane season begins in June and ends in November; however, most hurricanes bypass Florida entirely. On the rare occasion that a hurricane makes landfall in Florida, warnings go out well in advance.

New page added to www.BuyAFloridaVacationHome.com

Seagrove Beach

History of Seagrove Beach

Seagrove Beach is an old, charming town that people have brought their families to year after year since the forties and fifties. It is situated on the Panhandle in Northwest Florida between the larger cities of Panama City and Destin. You can find oceanfront homes with large, screened-in porches between collections of lush, mature plants and trees which tempt visitors with peaceful, cozy retreats. Seagrove Beach also boasts a wide variety of recreational opportunities like sandcastle building, swimming, snorkeling, surfing, and tanning; you can even swim with the dolphins. Two lakes near Seagrove Beach, Eastern Lake and Deer Lake, offer kayaking, canoeing, boating, fishing, and picnicing. For those who prefer dry land, Seagrove Beach includes biking and hiking trails, tennis, and golf. Just a few minutes' drive from Seagrove Beach lie a large number of art galleries, antique shops, and award-winning eateries. Take a day to explore the other beach villages nearby: one of them, Seaside, is world-famous, and was the setting for Jim Carrey's 1998 movie "The Truman Show." For a purely Florida vacation, leave the amusement park crowds behind; Seagrove Beach is the vacation of your dreams.