Nina, Pinta headed back to Punta Gorda
SUN FILE PHOTO BY BARBARA BEAN-MELLINGER
The Pinta, shown here, and the Nina each took nearly three years to build using only hand tools. They previously visited the area in December 2011. The floating museums will be back in town March 29, and will be open to the public for a fee ranging from $5 to $8, through April 3 at Fishermen’s Village in Punta Gorda.
PUNTA GORDA — With all the well-deserved fanfare of the 500th anniversary of Juan Ponce de Leon’s arrival in Charlotte Harbor in 1513, replicas of two other historic ships that explored the New World some 21 years before de Leon will arrive next weekend at Fishermen’s Village.
They are handmade reproductions — crafted in the British Virgin Islands without power tools — of two Christopher Columbus’ iconic, history-making ships, the Nina and the Pinta.
