Savannah

When I left off last we were still in the Smokey Mountains, we got up and took this photo below and then started that days adventure that would take us on the road to Savannah GA.

We had stopped at the store the night before in Gatlinburg so we had food and snacks for the 6 hour drive, we traded off the driving, I drove the first 2 hours and then Diane did two hours, then I finished up. It sure is nice to have someone else do some driving; it really breaks up the trip.

The drive was pretty basic, nothing really to speak of, as we got off 95 we got on a couple smaller highways to finish up the last 20 miles of the drive, we came across a stand that said, “your last chance for Peaches half mile ahead” (We didn’t stop) then 2 miles latter another stand that said “Last chance for Peaches” but we kept on driving, I have never heard the saying South Carolina Peaches anyways, Georgia Peaches of course. We then crossed the bridge from S.C. to Georgia and we could see Savannah to our left and industrial complexes on the river to our right. We circled the off ramp and it brings you right into town. On the right were several bus tour facilities. We continued on and took a left on MLK drive and then a right on Broughton, that seemed like a main street in town and also the street our Bed and Breakfast (The Marshall House) was on - More to come about the Bed and Breakfast tomorrow. We arrived at our hotel, pulled up to Valet parking, they got our bags out, we checked in, and the bellhop walked us to our room and gave us some basic information about the city.

After we got settled in, we decided to walk around and see what the city had to offer. We started by going to the riverfront. You have to walk down probably 30 small brick stairs and at the bottom is a brick road with trolley tracks going down the middle of it, with shops and restaurants on one side and the river on the other. I wasn’t that impressed with this area; it is definitely the “tourist” part of town. I feel like they could do a lot more with the waterfront, there was a little park that went along the river, but it didn’t seem that well thought out. We then decided to head to the City Market, about a two-block walk. This is another tourist area, but done well. There are all kinds of little shops with local artist and taffy/ice cream shops. We went into several of the galleries one was of Thomas Kinkade. I thought a lot of his work was really nice, but some of it was very gaudy, like his Disney work. Across the street from there was a really great artist A.T Hun that had paintings with subjects from The Big Labowski (Right as you walk in) to a huge John Wayne with a Raccoon hat on.

After the City Market we came back to the Hotel, I have to tell you my first impressions of Savannah was not that great, I thought if this is all that’s to it, I have no idea what we are going to do here for two days.

We re-grouped at the hotel for about an hour, got a local map, and realized we have not even begun to see the city. There are squares every couple blocks in every direction from our hotel. These squares are individually beautiful. They have huge Oak trees with Spanish moss hanging from them; there are park benches and usually a monument in each one. Most of them have a beautiful church across the street.

As we walked through square after square we finally made our way to Forsyth Park were the below fountain is located.

Here you will find things like people walking their dogs, couples sitting and relaxing as tourist walk up and take their photo with the fountain as their backdrop

On the walk back to the hotel I stopped and took some photos. I came across a chair hanging on the wall next to the entrance of an office, a door surrounded by ivy.

It was a hot 95 muggy day. We decided to grab something to eat and get into some air-conditioning. We came across the Moon River Brewing Company. It had the first key ingredient (Air-conditioning) it also had Arnold Palmer’s and water. I had Chicken with Sausage and Diane had Crab Cakes with Escalloped Potatoes that were to die for (Not as good as my Mom’s but pretty close) Diane decided to call it a night, and I walked around for another hour or so taking photos before calling it a night myself.

So the first hour in Savannah I was not a big fan, but by the end of day one, I was starting to get what all the hype was about.