Southern Hospitality Tour Part II (Electric Boogaloo): Savannah, GA
Savannah GA: The Hostess City of the South
Friday night we got into Savannah late enough to call it a night. When we awakened Saturday morning Tropical Storm Barry was reigning raining over the Coastal Empire. We had to hit up the supermarket in the morning, so we went to Piggly Wiggly (admittedly, largely just because I wanted to claim I had been to a Piggly Wiggly, and it wasn't far from our hotel) where I also got an umbrella. It was the most horrible cheap umbrella ever, and I would replace it before the day was out. We went to McDonald's out of a desire to try the premium chicken club or whatever because it looked good. that was NOT the case (I told you I'd tell you when the food wasn't good!) Part of the excuse is that they ran out of the buns they were supposed to be on so they just put them on straight hamburger buns instead of, oh I don't know, telling us! Plus it was basically a chicken nugget with some fixins anyway. And the fries weren't even good, so maybe it was just that location that was wack.
After that we headed downtown to the visitor's center, where we were to meet the Negro History tour we were taking. After putzing around trying to figure out exactly where to meet the guy, we were approached by our tour guide--who didn't have his bus. See, what had happened was, he was supposed to have gone to their headquarters to get the bus and come get us, but he left the bus keys at home. It turned out it was just the two of us on the tour anyway, so we ended up going in his car. A little bootleg, but probably a better deal, considering it was raining and we would have had to fight foggy windows moreso in a bus than in his car. Our tour guide was Trini but had been in Savannah for 31 years, 11 months, and 2 days (as of the date of the tour). He was quite knowledgeable and showed us a good deal of the black history of Savannah that the "mainstream" tours no doubt leave out.
Following the tour it was back to the visitor's center, which also houses the historical museum. We watched a movie narrated by the statue of James Oglethorpe on the history of Savannah and then checked out the exhibits. After that it was down to River Street to attempt to pick up the tickets for the cruise. This proved a bit of a daunting task in the torrential downpour, but after getting out of the car, then me going back to the car while Megan searched and bringing it around, and then going back around and seeing it when we could actually see. So after that it was back to the hotel to actually dry the hell out and get ready for the cruise.
So we got G'd up and headed back to River Street for our cruise to depart. On the way back to the hotel we had picked up an umbrella that didn't suck as much from the CVS, so we were a little more prepared for the elements... plus the rain had subsided a bit. Still though, it made it so that the hat I was rocking was both stylish and functional. We boarded our riverboat cruise ship and Megan got complimented on her dress the second she got on (naturally). We were seated next to an older couple named Nancy and Grady from Norfolk, VA. the food on the cruise was pretty good, and there was a group of girl scouts (Savannah is like girl scout central because the founder was from there) who were dancing to various dancing songs including the Cha-Cha Slide, the Macarena, and YMCA. It was like a sorority pledge class a few years too early. Still though, the cruise was good times, despite it having been raining. However, the rain did curtail our plans for the evening; we intended to hang out on River Street that evening and enjoy the nightlife, and the rain had subsided some, but we decided to raincheck it (ha!) until the next night. We did, however, hang out long enough to go to the Savannah's Candy Kitchen, sample, and promptly buy, their pralines, of which we got a tin that came home with us and lasted only a few days. While walking down River Street, some guy yelled out of a car window at me "That's my pimp right there!" Apparently something about us elicits people yelling out of cars at us. It was then back to the hotel to hope that it wasn't raining when we got up in the morning.
Luckily, it wasn't! so it was back down to River Street to poke around and be touristy. We started out at Huey's, a restaurant that was supposed to have a jazz brunch. Brunch was great, but the jazz was no where to be found. We ate in an indoor-outdoor bar area, which actually was pretty apropos... we ate probably most of our meals outside, come to think of it. I had a seafood omelette, and although I wasn't entirely sure how I felt about that, I figured what the hell and got it anyway and wasn't at all disappointed. On the contrary, it was great! Megan has a turkey mushroom sandwich that was kinda sealed on the sides a la hot pocket. For "dessert" we had their beignets, which were amazing, even if we did end up partially covered in powdered sugar.
We checked out the various shops up and down River Street, including their open air market. River Street is built on some bluffs where the city meets the Savannah River, so the steps climbing up to the next level were a bitch and a half. Once we made it up there, we realized that parking on the upper level (and the lower level, but it was all full) was free because it was the weekend, so we were sitting in a pay lot down on the bottom for nothing. Boo. we also got some gelati from the ice cream shop adjacent to the aforementioned candy shop. The various people playing music or drawing portraits or making roses out of palm fronds reminded me of an interesting maxim: You can do just about anything in a tourist town and find some sucker to pay you for it.
We left the River Street area and went on to check out some of Savannah's squares. We set the car down by Forsyth Park and walked around a good deal of the squares. We saw a guy walking three dogs--a pretty big dog, a small bulldog, and a little fluffy dog. We postulated that he was walking his dog, his kids' dog, and his wife's dog.
We went back to the hotel for a bit before heading back out to the Mellow Mushroom for dinner. Service sucked and by the time we got our pizza we had to pack it up and run. Our waitress sucked (and not just for the late pizza) and her tip reflected it. After finding parking, we had to literally run to make it to the departure point for our horse and carriage. Turned out it was running a bit late so we were fine. We were riding with 3 kids from Birmingham who for whatever reason were expecting the history tour and not the ghost tour we were expecting, so we ended up with a kinda of half and half dealy. After the tour, it was down to River Street for the social life we had missed the night before. Well, there was nothing of the sort--there were few people hanging out in Wet Willie's and a few other local bars and really nothing jumping off. It was still kinda early--the tour ended at around 10, so we sat around by the river for a bit and listened to a trumpeter and a guy talking to himself. After that, we did one more once-through of River Street and the surrounding area before determining that Savannah night life sucks on Sunday nights. Even the famed gay club One was decidedly not bumpin'. We went back to the hotel dejectedly--it was our last night in Savannah and we got shafted on the night life. Curse you, Barry!
Monday morning we had the rest of the leftover pizza from Mellow Mushroom for breakfast, checked out of our hotel and headed out to Tybee Island, which sits off the coast of Savannah. We climbed up the 178 steps to the top of the famous Tybee Island Lighthouse, which was no easy task after having climbed all the various stairs over the rest of the trip. We also checked out the museum at old fort Screven before walking on the beach at Tybee for a bit and getting out of there just before it started raining. From there it was back through Savannah and back home, stopping at Cracker Barrel for dinner before finally landing back in Greensboro.
good times! Pictures will follow.
Friday night we got into Savannah late enough to call it a night. When we awakened Saturday morning Tropical Storm Barry was reigning raining over the Coastal Empire. We had to hit up the supermarket in the morning, so we went to Piggly Wiggly (admittedly, largely just because I wanted to claim I had been to a Piggly Wiggly, and it wasn't far from our hotel) where I also got an umbrella. It was the most horrible cheap umbrella ever, and I would replace it before the day was out. We went to McDonald's out of a desire to try the premium chicken club or whatever because it looked good. that was NOT the case (I told you I'd tell you when the food wasn't good!) Part of the excuse is that they ran out of the buns they were supposed to be on so they just put them on straight hamburger buns instead of, oh I don't know, telling us! Plus it was basically a chicken nugget with some fixins anyway. And the fries weren't even good, so maybe it was just that location that was wack.
After that we headed downtown to the visitor's center, where we were to meet the Negro History tour we were taking. After putzing around trying to figure out exactly where to meet the guy, we were approached by our tour guide--who didn't have his bus. See, what had happened was, he was supposed to have gone to their headquarters to get the bus and come get us, but he left the bus keys at home. It turned out it was just the two of us on the tour anyway, so we ended up going in his car. A little bootleg, but probably a better deal, considering it was raining and we would have had to fight foggy windows moreso in a bus than in his car. Our tour guide was Trini but had been in Savannah for 31 years, 11 months, and 2 days (as of the date of the tour). He was quite knowledgeable and showed us a good deal of the black history of Savannah that the "mainstream" tours no doubt leave out.
Following the tour it was back to the visitor's center, which also houses the historical museum. We watched a movie narrated by the statue of James Oglethorpe on the history of Savannah and then checked out the exhibits. After that it was down to River Street to attempt to pick up the tickets for the cruise. This proved a bit of a daunting task in the torrential downpour, but after getting out of the car, then me going back to the car while Megan searched and bringing it around, and then going back around and seeing it when we could actually see. So after that it was back to the hotel to actually dry the hell out and get ready for the cruise.
So we got G'd up and headed back to River Street for our cruise to depart. On the way back to the hotel we had picked up an umbrella that didn't suck as much from the CVS, so we were a little more prepared for the elements... plus the rain had subsided a bit. Still though, it made it so that the hat I was rocking was both stylish and functional. We boarded our riverboat cruise ship and Megan got complimented on her dress the second she got on (naturally). We were seated next to an older couple named Nancy and Grady from Norfolk, VA. the food on the cruise was pretty good, and there was a group of girl scouts (Savannah is like girl scout central because the founder was from there) who were dancing to various dancing songs including the Cha-Cha Slide, the Macarena, and YMCA. It was like a sorority pledge class a few years too early. Still though, the cruise was good times, despite it having been raining. However, the rain did curtail our plans for the evening; we intended to hang out on River Street that evening and enjoy the nightlife, and the rain had subsided some, but we decided to raincheck it (ha!) until the next night. We did, however, hang out long enough to go to the Savannah's Candy Kitchen, sample, and promptly buy, their pralines, of which we got a tin that came home with us and lasted only a few days. While walking down River Street, some guy yelled out of a car window at me "That's my pimp right there!" Apparently something about us elicits people yelling out of cars at us. It was then back to the hotel to hope that it wasn't raining when we got up in the morning.
Luckily, it wasn't! so it was back down to River Street to poke around and be touristy. We started out at Huey's, a restaurant that was supposed to have a jazz brunch. Brunch was great, but the jazz was no where to be found. We ate in an indoor-outdoor bar area, which actually was pretty apropos... we ate probably most of our meals outside, come to think of it. I had a seafood omelette, and although I wasn't entirely sure how I felt about that, I figured what the hell and got it anyway and wasn't at all disappointed. On the contrary, it was great! Megan has a turkey mushroom sandwich that was kinda sealed on the sides a la hot pocket. For "dessert" we had their beignets, which were amazing, even if we did end up partially covered in powdered sugar.
We checked out the various shops up and down River Street, including their open air market. River Street is built on some bluffs where the city meets the Savannah River, so the steps climbing up to the next level were a bitch and a half. Once we made it up there, we realized that parking on the upper level (and the lower level, but it was all full) was free because it was the weekend, so we were sitting in a pay lot down on the bottom for nothing. Boo. we also got some gelati from the ice cream shop adjacent to the aforementioned candy shop. The various people playing music or drawing portraits or making roses out of palm fronds reminded me of an interesting maxim: You can do just about anything in a tourist town and find some sucker to pay you for it.
We left the River Street area and went on to check out some of Savannah's squares. We set the car down by Forsyth Park and walked around a good deal of the squares. We saw a guy walking three dogs--a pretty big dog, a small bulldog, and a little fluffy dog. We postulated that he was walking his dog, his kids' dog, and his wife's dog.
We went back to the hotel for a bit before heading back out to the Mellow Mushroom for dinner. Service sucked and by the time we got our pizza we had to pack it up and run. Our waitress sucked (and not just for the late pizza) and her tip reflected it. After finding parking, we had to literally run to make it to the departure point for our horse and carriage. Turned out it was running a bit late so we were fine. We were riding with 3 kids from Birmingham who for whatever reason were expecting the history tour and not the ghost tour we were expecting, so we ended up with a kinda of half and half dealy. After the tour, it was down to River Street for the social life we had missed the night before. Well, there was nothing of the sort--there were few people hanging out in Wet Willie's and a few other local bars and really nothing jumping off. It was still kinda early--the tour ended at around 10, so we sat around by the river for a bit and listened to a trumpeter and a guy talking to himself. After that, we did one more once-through of River Street and the surrounding area before determining that Savannah night life sucks on Sunday nights. Even the famed gay club One was decidedly not bumpin'. We went back to the hotel dejectedly--it was our last night in Savannah and we got shafted on the night life. Curse you, Barry!
Monday morning we had the rest of the leftover pizza from Mellow Mushroom for breakfast, checked out of our hotel and headed out to Tybee Island, which sits off the coast of Savannah. We climbed up the 178 steps to the top of the famous Tybee Island Lighthouse, which was no easy task after having climbed all the various stairs over the rest of the trip. We also checked out the museum at old fort Screven before walking on the beach at Tybee for a bit and getting out of there just before it started raining. From there it was back through Savannah and back home, stopping at Cracker Barrel for dinner before finally landing back in Greensboro.
good times! Pictures will follow.