Columbia Restaurant – Ybor City

When we visited the Ybor City neighborhood in Tampa Florida in early September, it was lunch time.  I knew where we ‘had’ to go for lunch as I’d eaten there at least twice before…

My choice was the original Columbia Restaurant on East 7^{th Avenue}.  As the mosaic sign above clearly states, the restaurant was established back in the prosperous heyday of Ybor City when it was the cigar making center of the USA and thousands of folks were busy rolling and selling cigars.

This restaurant has not only survived the vagaries of an up and down economy over the years, it has grown into a multi-unit operation as well!  In addition to the original Ybor City/Tampa location, other Columbia restaurants are located in Sarasota (We’ve eaten there too), St. Augustine, Clearwater Beach and Orlando.  In addition, the company operates cafes in the Tampa Bay History Center and at the Tampa International Airport.    

The outside of the Ybor City location is eye catching and classic with ornate tile work, Moorish arches and even an impressive entrance… 

The Columbia Restaurant seems to serve as an anchor at one end of Ybor City Historic District’s main street.   This overall National Register of Historic Places Historic District includes a total of 956 buildings!

The interior of the Columbia Restaurant is every bit as impressive as the exterior!  The photos above of the lobby/reception area, enclosed center dining courtyard and one of the dining rooms are just a sample of the highly decorative nature of this entire enormous restaurant.

The Columbia Restaurant is the oldest continuously operated restaurant in Florida.  It’s also the oldest Spanish restaurant in the United States and one of the largest Spanish restaurants in the world with 1,700 seats in 15 dining rooms.  The structure occupies a full city block with 52,000 square feet of space.  After 110 years, this landmark restaurant is still owned by members of the founding family!

Now onto our luncheon…

Laurie started out with a glass of Sangria. ($7.00)  I had a Miller Lite ($3.95) and Dawn Marie had a club soda. ($3.00) Laurie liked her Sangria but it couldn’t compare with the version that she enjoyed at Brooklyn’s Backyard Restaurant in Ocala a day earlier…

My first dining experience at the Columbia Restaurant was in the late 1980s and I’d really enjoyed my dinner.  I’d been back to this location one additional time in the mid to late 1990s and I hadn’t been as enamored with the cuisine as I was the first time…

This was our appetizer, the Columbia’s version of Queso Fundido. ($9.00) This version consisted of mild Tetilla cheese from Galicia in northwest Spain which is baked in a Rioja tomato sauce until it’s melted.  It was served with toasted Cuban bread points.  There was nothing wrong with it but we prefer the spicier Mexican Queso Fundido…

Laurie ordered the Coca de Langosta for her lunch. ($12.50) Coca, a Catalonian flatbread, is brushed with the restaurants 1905 sauce, then its topped with Spanish chorizo, diced vine-ripe tomatoes, Maine lobster meat and Manchego cheese.  It was baked until crisp and then it was drizzled with Piquillo pepper aioli.  She did enjoy her lunch giving it a very good rating…

I ordered the Havana Club Sandwich. ($9.95) I was looking for something other than a Cuban sandwich…which I’ve always felt were bland…at least for my taste.  I will note that the Columbian Restaurant prides itself on its version of the Cuban…

The Havana Club Sandwich included turkey, bacon, ham, Swiss cheese, tomato and mayonnaise on Cuban bread. It was served with plantain chips.  It was OK if not great…

Dawn Marie went with the Half and Half Combo for her lunch. ($12.50) She chose a half Cuban Sandwich accompanied by the restaurant’s original 1905 Salad.  Her half sandwich was made up with ham, Genoa salami, Cuban mojo-marinated roast pork, Swiss cheese, pickle and mustard.  It is all layered on sliced, freshly baked Tampa Cuban bread.  Dawn thought that her lunch was just fine…

It’s hard to really evaluate a restaurant based on a lunch consisting of flatbread and sandwiches.  The ambience in the courtyard was very nice, service was efficient and our lunch was just fine but nothing special either.  No matter what, this restaurant is worth the visit just to experience the architecture and over the top decorative embellishments.  The original Columbia Restaurant is located at 2117 East 7th Avenue in the Ybor City neighborhood of Tampa Florida.  Phone: 813-248-4961.  The company’s Website is at: http://www.columbiarestaurant.com/.  

  

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by for a visit to a Tampa area icon!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave

A Fall Drive in the Smoky Mountains!

In late October, Laurie and I decided that since it was a beautiful sunny day, it was time for us to drive up into the Smoky Mountains and check out the fall colors…

We only live about 45 minutes from Cades Cove in the Smoky Mountains National Park but during this time of the year, that area is packed with sight seers.  However, Tellico Plains and the beginning of the Cherohala Scenic Skyway are only 30 minutes from our house.  While the fall colors hadn’t peaked down in the Tennessee River Valley yet, as we gained altitude, the change in seasons was much more pronounced.

The Cherohala Skyway National Scenic Byway winds among the mountaintops in the Cherokee and Nantahala national forests – thus the name “Cherohala.”  The road, (TN Hwy. 165/NC Hwy. 143), connects Tellico Plains Tennessee to Robbinsville North Carolina across 51 miles of wide 2 lane highway that climbs to over 5,000 ft. above sea level.

We encountered some traffic from time to time as we climbed up toward the Tennessee-North Carolina State line, but there weren’t any stoppages and it flowed along…

FYI…  A ‘National Scenic Byway’ is a road recognized by the United States Department of Transportation for one or more of six "intrinsic qualities": archeological, cultural, historic, natural, recreational, and scenic.  In addition the “most scenic” byways are designated as ‘All-American Roads’, which must meet two out of the six intrinsic qualities.  The latter designation means the road has features that do not exist elsewhere in the United States and they are unique and important enough to be tourist destinations unto themselves.

There are a number of viewpoints or vistas along the Cherohala Byway on both sides of the border.  Some have views to the west and some toward the east.  This easterly view was from the Tennessee side of the Byway.

Factoids:

·       There are at least 120 National Scenic Byways and 31 All-American Roads located in 46 states. 

·       The only states that lack a National Scenic Byway or All-American Road are Hawaii, Nebraska, Rhode Island, and Texas.  There must be a story or two there… In Hawaii for example, what about the road to Hana on Maui?

As we climbed over 2,500 feet and up to 3,500 feet, the color increased and brightened…

Traffic dropped off but we did see evidence of a booming business.  During our drive and sight-seeing stops along the way we saw a couple hundred ‘trike’ or 3-wheel motorcycles.  They vastly outnumbered the 2 wheel version.  This relatively ‘new’ business is probably an indicator of our aging population…

Some of the better known National Scenic Byways include: Great River Road which follows along the Mississippi River from Minnesota to Mississippi; Flint Hills in Kansas, and Death Valley in California.  The All-America Roads are even better known.  Examples include: Blue Ridge Parkway in Virginia and North Carolina; Bear Tooth Pass Scenic Highway in Montana and Wyoming, and Florida Keys Scenic Highway.

Laurie loves to take photos of the sunlight streaming down through the forest creating that natural cathedral look…

You will note that brown and burnt orange dominate this photo.  Above 4,000 feet the peak of the color season had already passed.  As we neared the North Carolina border, we passed Haw Knob, at 5,472 ft. the highest point along the Byway.

Then after we crossed the state line into North Carolina and headed down to lower elevations, the vibrant colors picked up again.

These photos were taken at Obadiah Gap (elevation 3,740 ft.) along the Byway in North Carolina…

Note: The Cherohala Scenic Byway is part of the loop favored by motorcyclists and sports car drivers that begins or ends with a portion of US Hwy. 129, “The Dragon” aka “The Tail of the Dragon”.  Riders/drivers start in either North Carolina or Tennessee and using the 2 different roads, they can complete a challenging route…  Traffic on The Dragon can be heavy and it is not a place for sightseeing.  The 11 mile stretch has 318 curves, big trucks are banned and typically a couple of motorcyclists are killed on that piece of road every year.  On the other hand, the Cherohala portion of the loop is a safe and scenic drive. 

  

To learn about the National Scenic Byways and the All-American Roads near you, go to the interactive map at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/byways/.

Once we passed over the mountains into North Carolina we wanted to avoid the risks along The Tail of the Dragon…our most direct route home…so we headed south on US Hwy. 74 past Murphy to NC Hwy. 294 and the Tennessee State line. 

Along the way, we took a little side trip to check out the Hiwassee Dam.  This is one of three dams on the river owned and operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority.  The TVA built the dam in the late 1930s to bring flood control and electricity to the region.  It impounds Hiwassee Lake with 6,000 surface acres of water. 

The Hiwassee Dam is 307 feet tall and it’s the third highest dam in the TVA system.  The Hiwassee River actually flows northwestward from its source in through Western North Carolina, where it proceeds to slice a scenic valley through the southern Appalachian Mountains in route to its mouth along Chickamauga Lake (Tennessee River) in Tennessee.  The Hiwassee River is 147 miles long…

The Hiwassee Impoundment (Lake) created by the dam, stretches for 22 miles back to Murphy North Carolina and it has about 180 miles of shoreline.  It’s a beautiful lake that is mostly surrounded by the 531,270 acre Nantahala National Forest.  From the lack of fall colors in these photos, it’s evident that we were back down in the lowland area of North Carolina. 

It was a great day for a drive in the mountains!  Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for coming along on our fall color drive!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave

A Visit to Ybor City

Visiting Florida in early September can be challenging given the heat and humidity… Of course we ended up walking the streets of Ybor City on a day when the heat index was uncomfortably over 100 degrees!

Ybor City is actually not a city per se but rather a historic neighborhood in Tampa Florida.  It’s located just northeast of downtown.  Ybor City was founded in the 1880s by cigar manufacturers and was populated by thousands of immigrants, mainly from Cuba, Spain, and Italy.  For the next 50 years, workers in Ybor City's cigar factories rolled millions of cigars annually.

The population dropped and the Ybor City declined beginning during the Great Depression.  The decline accelerated after World War II, which lead to a period of abandonment and decay.  After several decades of neglect, a portion of the original neighborhood has been redeveloped into a night club and entertainment district.

We stopped in a shop along the main thoroughfare where Dawn Marie bought this very reasonably priced and cute straw hat.  The shop was a combination bar and cigar store with a nice hat selection as well… I took this photo of Dawn Marie and Laurie as we enjoyed a few moments of air conditioned comfort!

The neighborhood has been designated as a National Historic Landmark District, and several structures in the area are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.  In 2008…this street, 7th Avenue, which is the main commercial thoroughfare in Ybor City, was recognized as one of the “10 Great Streets in America” by the American Planning Association.

The ladies were ready to shop…and they were highly disappointed at the lack of places to spend our money.  There were bars, restaurants, tattoo parlors, cigar factories and cigar shops…but no really interesting places for them to spend some money.

In the early 1880s, Tampa was just an isolated village with a population of less than 1000 people.  However, its combination of a good port, a new railroad line, and humid climate attracted the attention of Vicente Martinez Ybor, a prominent Spanish-born cigar manufacturer.  Ybor had moved his cigar-making operation from Cuba to Key West, Florida in 1869, due to political turmoil in the then-Spanish colony.  But, labor unrest and the lack of room for expansion had him looking for another base of operations, preferably by building his own company town. 

Ybor decided that an area of sandy scrubland just northeast of Tampa would be the best location.  In 1885, the Tampa Board of Trade helped broker an initial purchase of 40 acres of land, and Ybor quickly bought more.  Since Tampa didn’t possess a workforce able to man the new factories, Ybor built hundreds of small houses to attract an influx of mainly Cuban and Spanish cigar workers, many of whom followed him from Key West and Cuba.  Other cigar manufacturers also moved in, quickly making Tampa and Ybor City a major cigar production center.

Dawn Marie was corralled by an elderly gentleman sitting outside one of the cigar stores.  I made the error of joining her while Laurie wisely moved on down the sidewalk where she took this photo.  Our ‘captor’ had been raised in Ybor City and lived there all of his life.  But, instead of talking about the area and its history, he spent most of our time talking to us about baseball…hardly a topic that either of us have expertise in…

The desk clerk at our Hampton Inn in Largo referred us to Tabanero Cigars, a cigar factory in Ybor City that is owned by a cousin of hers.  We don’t smoke cigars (or anything else) but we decided to have a look anyway… We do like the smell of tobacco leaves.  

While at its peak there were over 200 cigar factories in the Tampa area but that number is now down to just a handful of survivors.  Over 500,000,000 cigars were rolled in Ybor City in 1929, which is also the year that the Great Depression began.  To learn more about Ybor City, you can go to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ybor_City.

This is the workshop inside the Tabanero Cigar facility.  This brand advertises that their cigars are made in the USA by Cuban artisans.  Tours are offered for $10.00 per person but we just asked if we could take a couple of photos.  There was a tip jar for passersby like ourselves…

The proprietor/manager told us that each of the workers in the factory produces about 100 cigars a day.  His typical cigar 'roller' has many years of experience.  There was ongoing chatter in Spanish and it appeared that everyone enjoyed their work…

I used to smoke an occasional cigar but the CEO of one company that I worked for really liked his cigars.  The management team would have a meeting in a conference room and everyone would light up.  A thick cloud resulted each time and that experience ‘cured me’.  I gave them up!   

There was a coffee kiosk and a number of comfortable chairs set up at the back of the facility.  The boxes on the left were stacked with 50 count ‘wheels’ of cigars.  Tabanero Cigars advertises that this is the only Tampa cigar factory to make all long filler Tampa Cigars.  Reportedly for every 100 handmade Tampa Cigars sold a local Cuban American roller, that worker will take home $80 to $120 dollars per day.

Laurie did buy 3 cigars…one for her brother-in-law and another for each of two nephews.  Single cigars cost from $4.00 to $20.00 each and 20 count boxes cost between $100 and $180.  Tabanero Cigars is located at 1601 East 7^th Avenue in Ybor City (Tampa).  Phone: 813-402-6316.  Website: http://www.tabanerocigars.com/.

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by for a visit!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave

Great “Find” in Ocala – Brooklyn’s Backyard

During our trip in early September, I’d planned to stay overnight in Ocala before rolling into the Tampa/Clearwater area early the next day.  As usual we stayed at a Hampton Inn…almost always reliable!

I’d done a bit of digging via the Internet in order to find a good or at least interesting and different place to have dinner after our long drive from East Tennessee…

This is Brooklyn’s Backyard.  It was located in a strip shopping center well off the Interstate highway.  It caught my attention as both the menu and concept seemed quirky.  In addition it ranked 12^th among Ocala area restaurants with 83 Excellent/Very Good vs. 8 Poor/Terrible reviews…equaling my desired 10:1 ratio.

Now you see what I meant about a quirky concept!  It’s backyard dining indoors…  The restaurant’s motto is “Good Beer.  Better Food.”  The menu includes finger food (appetizers), soup, salads, burgers, sandwiches, flatbreads, salads with homemade dressings, pizza, Stromboli, calzone, chicken wings and desserts.

For drinks there was craft beer, wine and Sangria.  I am not a beer connoisseur…Miller Lite is my standard so I like light beers.  Our very helpful and pleasant waiter Ryan suggested that I order a Lost Coast Tangerine Wheat. ($5.00) It was so good that I ended up ordering 2 of them…

Laurie ordered the Sangria. ($8.00) While I thought that it was a little pricy, Laurie flat out said that it was the best Sangria she’d ever had!  That made Ryan very happy as he is the one who makes up the Sangria for Brooklyn’s Backyard.

The informality of the restaurant was reflected in the dining tables and chairs, a deck, lanterns, stars on the ceiling and walls, wooden beams, faux grass and this big blackboard advertising specials, new items and music every Friday night…

This looks like a pizza…but on the menu it is listed under “The Flats”.  The Salerno flatbread ($8.99) consists of blackened Alfredo sauce, topped with blackened chicken and mozzarella cheese.  This was Laurie’s dinner and she thought that it was great!  She gave me a bit or two and I agreed with her evaluation…

This ‘beast’ of a sandwich was what I ordered for dinner… It’s the Brick City Chicken Sandwich. ($10.99) For my side I had to choose between the mango slaw, cheddar cheese grits, park fries, sautéed vegetables, grandma’s mac and cheese, mushroom rice pilaf or this Jalapeno corn bread.  What the heck…we were on vacation!

My sandwich consisted of a country fried chicken breast topped with Black Forest ham, hand cut French fries and country gravy.  My doctor would definitely not approve!  However, although it was very messy to eat, it was also very good indeed…

Brooklyn’s Backyard is located at 2019 Silver Springs Boulevard in Ocala Florida.  Phone: 352-304-6292.  Their website can be found at http://brooklynsbackyard.com/.

Note: I was curious about the name of my sandwich…”Brick City” Chicken Sandwich.  It turns out that much of Ocala’s downtown area was destroyed by fire on Thanksgiving Day, 1883.  The city encouraged rebuilding with brick, granite and steel rather than lumber.  Consequently by 1888, Ocala was known statewide as "The Brick City".

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by and checking out what’s for dinner!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave

Depots and Sandhill Cranes – Florida

On our trip to Florida in September to attend our friend’s annual wine tasting party, we stopped overnight in Ocala before our final short drive to Clearwater.  As usual, I’d done a bit of research looking for old railroad depots in the vicinity…

The Ocala Union Station (also known as Union Station Plaza) is a historic site in Ocala, Florida, United States.  It is located at 531 Northeast First Avenue.  It was built in 1917 by both the Atlantic Coast Line and Seaboard Air Line Railroads.  Before this station was built, ACL and SAL had separate depots in Ocala.  The first railroad arrived in Ocala in 1881.

As I was taking photos, along came this CSX freight train… Timing is everything!  Even if passenger trains don’t stop here any longer, a train rolling by adds to the feeling of this 98 year old railroad station complex.

The city is the county seat for Marion County and the population for the Ocala metropolitan statistical area is roughly 340,000.  Ocala was founded around 1849.

Factoid:

·       John Travolta and Kelly Preston live in the Ocala area.

Interestingly, the tracks for the two different rail lines intersect with each other at a 90 degree angle at the end of the depot on the right.  The other portion of the depot with its opposing set of tracks can be seen across the lawn and shrubs to the left…

Ocala's SunTran bus service still uses the station.  In addition, the Shuttleliner limo/van service offers several trips daily from here to Orlando’s International Airport.  The Community Redevelopment Area Design Studio and the office for Ocala’s Cultural Arts Coordinator are also housed in the depot.

The station served as a stop for Amtrak's Palmetto service until 2004, using the Seaboard Air Line's former tracks.  The former Atlantic Coast Line tracks are now part of Florida Northern Railroad.  

Currently Amtrak offers coach (bus) service from the station twice a day.  One route connects to the Silver Star (Amtrak train) in Lakeland and another run connects to the Silver Star (Amtrak train), this time in Jacksonville. 

Dee Dee’s Diner, also known as Dee Dee’s Dog House, is located in the Union Station complex right next to the depot.   I couldn’t find any references regarding the prior use of this building but it is old and was obviously part of the overall assembly of railroad related structures… Dee Dee’s was closed during our visit but this diner is on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/Dee-Dees-Diner-136071476423018/timeline/. 

Ocala is recognized as “A horse capital of the World”.  There are over 1,200 horse farms, (900 of them raising Thoroughbreds), covering 77,000 acres in the area.  This business supports 44,000 jobs and brings in $2,200,000,000 in revenues…  

As we headed south on state highways and side roads after leaving Ocala, I spotted these sandhill cranes grazing in a pasture.  The common name of these birds refers to habitat like that at the Platte River, on the edge of Nebraska's Sandhills on the American Plains.  They can be up to 4 feet tall but their wingspan can reach up to 7 feet 6 inches!

As we passed through Dade City Florida, I stopped to take a photo of this old depot…now a Dade City municipal building.  This depot was built by the Atlantic Coast Line Railway in 1912.  Amtrak's Palmetto passenger service was provided at this depot until November 2004.  Today it is served only by Amtrak's Thruway Motorcoach bus service between Jacksonville and Lakeland.

Dade City has a population of about 6,500 and it’s the county seat for Pasco County.  The town was first incorporated in the mid-1880s.  From what I read, Dade City is popular with tourists for its antique stores, restaurants and historic architecture.  The nearby Pioneer Florida Museum and Village features a 1913 35-ton Porter Locomotive among its exhibits… Website: http://www.pioneerfloridamuseum.org/.

Factoids:

·       An annual Kumquat Festival is hosted in Dade City.  The surrounding area is a large producer of the tart kumquat, a citrus fruit that is eaten whole.

·       During World War II, a prisoner-of-war camp was situated in Dade City.  The prisoners were German soldiers who were in Rommel's Afrika Korps and were captured in North Africa.

This lone sandhill crane was feeding right alongside the highway near the Dade City railroad depot.   I don’t know whether or not this is a Florida sandhill crane or a migratory sub-species.  Florida sandhill cranes are not very common with only about 5,000 remaining.  As one might suspect, they are mostly threatened by habitat destruction.  In Florida, they are protected by severe penalties for killing them, under both state and federal laws.

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by for a visit!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave