EL CAMINO REAL

Upon the arrival of the Spanish in the 1500's, they realized that the American Indian cultures had already established a series of roads.  A narrow path that had gradually worn down over centuries of use was labeled "El Camino Real."  We don't know most of it's exact location, but there is a very faint outline of a sunken road at Mission San Luis.  A broken-down oxcart marks its location.  This road stretched out over 455 miles clear across our state. It was used by the Spanish to spread the Christian gospel, and to move troops and even produce.  It was our first big interstate highway, and was known also as The King's road, Royal  Road, and Mission Road.  It connected a chain of 100 Franciscan missions reaching from Pensacola to St. Augustine. 

Our Old St. Augustine Road  follows a portion of the original path through parts of Tallahassee, east of downtown.  In his book, author John Hann, tells us there were three available routes used for trade between the Apalachee Indians and St. Augustine.  "Apalachee,: The Land Between the Rivers", tells us that the first route was the Royal Road.  The second was used for bulky and heavy goods, and was a sea route around the tip of Florida, that took at least two weeks to complete.  The third and final route, meant sailing on the Gulf, canoeing upriver, and then carrying goods overland,  Canoes brought supplies from the Wakulla, St. Marks, and/or the Wacissa rivers along the Gulf Coast all the way to the Suwanee.  Then they would journey upriver, off-load cargo, and either pack animals, and/or humans would carry the goods on to St. Augustine.  It wasn't until about 1680 that oxcarts were intrroduced by the Spanish, thus transporting more goods than human portages could.

By the 1800's ,El Camino Real went all the way to San Diego where it turned south to Mexico City.  In 1823 Congress funded the improvement of the "old Indian Trail", providing $20,000 for it.  It became the foundation for Florida's first federal highway, and was renamed the Bellamy Road.  The road had to be 25 feet wide, and tree stumps needed to be cut low enough so that a wagon floorboard could clear them.  Most of the road was built under the direction of John Bellamy, a wealthy Jefferson County planter, who used slave labor for the eastern half, from the Ochlockonee River to the St. John's.

With the building of Interstate 10, the "freeway of the Deep South"  fell out of favor.