June 1, 2021 – Travels with Fred

1 June 2021

In probably the best kept secret in south Florida, in the middle of Coconut Grove, you’ll find the Barnacle House. It was built by yacht designer Commodore Munroe and is the oldest house in Miami-Dade County that still stands on its original site. I’ll venture that 95% of the population of south Florida has never heard of the place nor visited it.

You really have to be looking for the place to find it. It’s pretty much across the street from the extinct Coconut Grove Playhouse and it sits on some of the most valuable land in Miami-Dade County because the back yard backs up to Biscayne Bay.

The entrance to The Barnacle House is about where you see the jogger next to the wall.

When the estate became too much of a burden to upkeep for his heirs, they donated the property to the state of Florida for a state park. Entrance fees are on the honor system and it costs $2. To enter, you step down from the sidewalk on Main Street in Coconut Grove and wind your way back through a trail surrounded by native trees to Florida. As you walk the trail, you’ll get a faint scent of skunk. That’s not the mammal. Instead it is skunkwood, common to the area, and it really does have a skunk-like aroma.

The way old Florida used to look. Florida stoppers are the shrubs found on the left and right of the trail.

Another common tree is the Florida stopper. It was used medicinally to “stop you up” if you had diarrhea.

You approach the house from the rear. It gives you a good idea of how people lived back in the day with the kitchen on the far end of the house to allow the inhabitants to escape the heat from a wood stove. The walls and chimneys are made from coral rock from the area.

The kitchen is a separate addition to the back of the house. Also notice the vent at the top of the main house.

The house was designed by Munroe and took advantage of the breezes off Biscayne Bay. All the windows would open and rooms with transoms led to a central stairwell that allowed the flow of air upward and out through the vent. Years ago I went into the house in the middle of summer and it was unbelievably cool. The air flow was very noticeable. It is still not air conditioned.

The “front lawn” of The Barnacle House. The shed was used to construct boats in the summer.

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As you approach the front of the house, the yard leads down to Biscayne bay and a boat house.

Munroe lived in the boat house while he constructed the main house. The bottom floor was used to design his yachts. By the way, his boat designs won most of the races from Miami to Key West because of the special hull he designed for shallow waters in the Keys.

The boathouse. It’s much repaired. It was severely damaged in Hurricane Andrew and yet withstood the hurricane. Munroe designed the house so the bottom front and back walls would blow out and leave the structure standing. It worked perfectly in Andrew.

If you walk past the boathouse, you’ll see a wonderful view of Biscayne Bay. I think you can see why it’s one of the most valuable properties in the state of Florida. On either side of the property are luxury condos and they don’t have half the view this property does.

Due to the pandemic, you can’t currently tour the home. However, I’ve been inside twice before and the house is really interesting. Hopefully they’ll be able to give guided tours before too long.