Savannah, GA
We arrived at Skidaway Island State Park - hands down, our favorite campground to date. Wide open spaces, tons of great biking and hiking trails, and an awesome interpretive center and camp shop that curates lots of local arts and crafts. Owen made a great video of the trails, interpretive center and campground here. We took the opportunity to marvel at all the massive live oaks, dripping with Spanish Moss from their limbs. Don’t touch the moss though - they have tiny little bugs in them, known as chiggers. The moss was originally used a long time ago to stuff mattresses and pillows - thus, where the origin of bed bugs came from! Interesting fact - this plant actually has no relation to the moss family. In fact, Spanish moss is a bromeliad (part of the pineapple family). But so pretty to look at, especially when there’s a slight breeze.
Tom has spent time in Savannah before and knew that we should take a history tour. We decided on this trolley company, who offered hop-on hop-off tours. Our first ride of the day was EXCELLENT as they had a tour guide, Gertrude, in period costume that did all the narrating. She was worth the price of admission alone. Later in the day when we hopped on, the driver was also the guide, and it wasn’t as entertaining or detailed, yet still informative. It was tougher near the end of the day to catch trolleys (they weren’t running on time, so lucky that it was a nice day and we still had the energy to walk). All I can say is that it really is worth taking a tour of this city to really appreciate the historic homes, the statutes that line the boulevards, the history of the cemetaries (the union soldiers actually hid out in one of them, disrupting many of the crypts). Some other highlights of this visit included:
Watching the massive container ships on the river going out to sea
Discovering Byrd’s Famous Cookies (the lemon were the best! although Owen loved the cupcake flavor
Strolling by the Waterfront, and checking out the JW Marriott - it was almost like a museum, filled with massive crystals and stones
We also checked out Isle of Palms, and had our first dinner outside on the ocean! We’ve really enjoyed both Charleston and Savannah, and would’ve loved two weeks each here.
Dates of stay: Sept 13 - 17
Next stop: Jacksonville, Florida to see the Healy side of the family