It seems incredible to think that a week ago, I was turning 27 and driving through the Georgian countryside on our way to the coast for Savannah. The routine of everyday life has already rooted itself again to feel like it's always been this way.
Savannah was a great getaway for us. (See the photos here.) We spent the first night camping at a historic park just outside Savannah that served as a fort during the Civil War to ward off Northern troops. We built a campfire, roasted hot dogs, pitched a tent, marveled at the spanish moss hanging from every tree branch, watched boys catch crabs in the river that flowed alongside the park, and toured the adjacent museum and restored fort. We doused ourselves in bug spray, slept on the unforgiving ground, and collected pollen on every surface imaginable until our shoes were coated in a neon yellow dust. We learned that hikes and cook-outs are probably more of our calling than full-out camping.
Then we drove into downtown historic Savannah and found our way to a little coffee shop whose line stretched out the door. We sat and ate our lunch (not cooked over a campfire, thankyouverymuch) and then jumped on a little street car that drove us around the city, pointing out a house that once belonged to pirates and that was built with all sorts of secret passage ways beneath it--and, as most things in Savannah--is supposedly haunted.
Our hotel overlooked the river and used to be a storage building for the cotton industry. I picked up a few books from the library about Savannah and did some reading on the drive down, learning all sorts of things about old Savannah life: their diet was filled with rice, cornmeal and sweet potatoes, and they seemed to fry everything. I thought back to my fridge and choice of apples and bananas back home and realized what a novelty it all is. They had communal ovens where people could come and cook things without making their houses any hotter than necessary. Even then, they spent their evenings outside; kids playing on the community squares that dot the city and parents retiring to the piazzas built onto their homes while the houses cool down inside.
Our trip was filled with a lot of restaurant eating, walking around and meandering through the gardens and parks nearby. Then we called it a night and went back to our hotel to watch the newest episode of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution and watch the fireworks over the river from our hotel room.
The next morning, we packed up and headed for home. A whirlwind weekend, but wholly worthwhile and relished. A happy birthday, indeed! All thanks to my dear, sweet husband.
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Our trip to Savannah in pictures
photo by ted reynolds
