🎼On the road again! 🎶
So the Beaver Lodge has taken to the road again! This is us ready to go but, like everything else with this van, there is a bit of a back story.
On the way driving down from State College to Phoenixville, Mike starts to feel an odd vibration. At first it is just at over 60 mph... then over 30. By the time he gets here he is at his wits end. Luckily I was able to get us an appointment at Sawchucks in Pottstown. They told me to bring it over and they'd see what they could do to squeeze us in. We crossed our fingers that it was, at best, a thrown wheel weight, and at worst loose U-Joints. They saw her on Friday... but too late for us as we needed to be in Maryland by 6 PM. So in typical fashion we just improvised and took my Subaru.
As you know, we are trying to hit as many of the States in the US as possible on this trip and thus far we had missed Delaware, so on the way to Maryland we thought we'd hit The First National Historic Park. Its park "headquarters" are in Newcastle but the park is actually in 7 locations all over the State. We chose to see the Green, which was formerly a military parade ground, outside the visitors Center and the Court House.
Our guide was fantastic and we left with much more information about the area and the history of Pennsylvania and Delaware than we intended. As you can tell from the picture above, it is a British style court.
I also loved the decorations on the bailiff's table. You could pay the fine imposed, go to jail or the stocks or the gallows, and all these outcomes are represented on his desk.
On our way back to the car I spotted William Penn's statue. The Delawarians will tell you that the real Penns Landing should be here and not in Philadelphia! Anyway we couldn't dawdle as we were having dinner with my friend, photographer and wandmaker Mike C. outside Baltimore. Then it was off to Becky and Dan's for the rest of the weekend. Then back to PA for the Beaver Lodge. P.S. It was the U-Joints, but all is well now and we'll be leaving on Monday morning.
So here we are putting the final items into the van and we're OFF!
As you can tell, the Beaver Lodge is feeling much better after her overhaul. She made it all the way to the first National Park of the second leg of the journey!...Don't laugh; I figured that if we could just hit one place, the van problems of the last month and a half would be over.
Again here is another reason why I like geocaching so much. Neither Mike nor I had a Geocache from Delaware so we thought we ought to rectify that. That's why we stopped in the town of Odessa and found this amazing graveyard.
One geocache led to another and we found ourselves in Odessa's historic quarter. This is the Corbit-Sharp House. It was built in 1774, a fine example of a brick Georgian house.
The origional owner was a tanner and I can't imagine him thinking that a pair of lowly travelers would be digging around for a geocache in his backyard.
Many hours later we arrived at one of Mike's favorite breweries. He's been talking about going to Burley Oak ever since I said I wanted to go to Assateague Island.
So here we are with a photograph of both of our samplers. Unfortunately for me it was about a 50-50 split between absolutely loved and really did not like. I guess that's what happens when you get creative and push the beer envelope.
I have wanted to come to Assateague Island ever since I read Misty of Chincoteague in my childhood. I really wish that I taken the time to re-read it before we visited, but that's one of those things that didn't quite happen. But here we are and the ponies even came out to greet us!
The visitor center is an amazing place. The Rangers here were extremely helpful and they have a tank where you can play with some of the local seafood.... I mean sea creatures of course! They also have an ocean tank and a bay tank that show you some of the fish that reside in the area as well. You can see a video of the visitor center here.
This is the bridge that takes you from the mainland to Assateague Island. If you look in the background, you can see Ocean City Maryland. I just want you to remember that this entire island was slated for 9,000 development plots in the 1950's. Then came the Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962. It destroyed what few buildings were on the island already and halted the plans for development. This is how the National Park became a reality on the island.
This is sunset on the Bay side. Just behind me is where our camper van is going to be located. But since we didn't have a whole lot of daylight left, we thought we'd use what we had to go and see a few things before dinner.
Of course one of the top things to see are the feral ponies. (They are not wild because they originate from domestic stock so the proper term is feral. I use the word wild to indicate a state of mind, not a classification of animal.)
They are completely wild and the National Park Service warns you not to pet them for the normal reasons… they kick and bite but also because they eat and walk in poison ivy. Many a person has gotten poison ivy from being too near the ponies. Lucky for us, they were happy to just stand still and have their photograph taken at a reasonable distance.
Unfortunately we didn't see any ponies on the beach but there was plenty of evidence that they are there. It would have been beautiful to see them walking here. There are two main rumors about the ponies; allow me to dispel them both here. The first is that the ponies have evolved to be able to drink seawater. If you think logically this can't be true. Name me any large land animal that is able to drink seawater with regularity... the answer is none. Ponies have adapted to living here and thereby are able to find the pools of fresh marsh water that you'll see later on in our travels. The second rumor is that they are descended from a Spanish shipwreck that occurred off the barrier island. There is no evidence that this is true and it's much more likely that they were brought to the island by farmers and homesteaders who abandoned them when they were no longer useful. This may be a much less glamorous beginning, but when you see the ponies now you're so glad that they have come to live and thrive here.
Here is Mike looking out towards Egg Island. It is named because the early settlers would go out to this island and spend their free time picnicking and gathering shore bird eggs which were considered a delicacy. Luckily now the shore birds' eggs are protected, but collecting other washed up items used to be a hobby, locally known as Progging.
Here is a view backwards over the Marsh Walk hike. We enjoyed walking around the boardwalk and seeing how the seagulls use it to smash open the clams. We also saw a Snowy Egret land in the marsh on the far side.
Here is the Beaver Lodge parked at its camp spot in Loop C. If you could look to the right of the van, you would walk down a small grassy area and out onto the Bay side. We picked it because it's a little more sheltered, and you can barely see it but there are 4 ponies just down the road.
Here is a close up of three of them as they stood blocking the road. The ponies are very sweet and like to eye you up and decide what you're doing, as much as you like to eye them up and decide what they are doing. If you'd like to see videos of the ponies there are several on our YouTube channel.
In the morning our outside water spigot was dripping slowly. Mike and I spent about an hour trying to fix it. During that time Mike stood up and saw the old mare. The Rangers had told us that this is her haunt and that we should keep an eye out for her. She may look skinny and frail but she is 35 years old and has lived her whole life as a wild pony. I know I keep using the word pony even though they are properly horses. It's just that the limited resources stunt their growth, making them pony-like in appearance. If you don't know a lot about horses, 35 years old is a pretty good run! As I watched her graze around the van, all I could think is that we've been alive about the same length of time.
After the van was fixed we headed off to do the Dune Walk. This is a hike right at the end of the day use area on the Maryland side of Assateague Island.
Mike is standing on the ruins of Baltimore Boulevard. This 15-mile road was constructed to be the Main Street of the 9,000 housing plots that I talked about earlier in the post. This and a few other sections of the road are all that is left. It's not the worst thing that the storm came and showed us that building on this island wasn't in our best interests. Now the only people who use it are the seagulls... they're smart enough to know that it's the best place in the area to drop their shellfish.
Here's Mike standing on the ocean side of the Maryland portion of Assateague. The beach on this side is beautiful with soft white sand and lots of birdlife.
The last walk that we did before leaving the park was called the forest walk. In this area you can see freshwater marshes and salt water marshes right next to each other. You can see where the ponies find their fresh water at the far left of this photo. The water table is high enough that it pokes through the forest floor. The salt marsh you see in front of you is also incredibly important as it is home to baby Sheepshead ("Convict fish") and Flounder before they make their way to the open ocean.
Unfortunately, even if we had an OSV (Over Sand Vehicle), we could not drive all the way to Chincoteague on the beach because there is a large barrier that separates the Maryland section from the Virginia section. So you have to take the long way around, which is OK because you get to go through some pretty countryside and some small towns.
Walking along the beach we were greeted by flocks of Plovers. Here we saw one plover feeding in this overturned horseshoe crab.
There is a long beach walk in Chincoteague that terminates in an abandoned Coast Guard station that used to be at the end of Assateague Island. One of the interesting things about this part of the barrier islands is that it is growing rather than eroding. Over the last 100 years a tremendous amount of sand has been added to the end of Assateague, forming what is now known as Tom's Hook. It is now a beautiful mature tree colony. The ranger told us that a Snowy Owl had been spotted here but we weren't lucky enough to see it.
Here is a picture of the tower and the main building of the abandoned Coast Guard station. I found it very charming because it is built in a manner that is consistent with many of the houses in the area. I love wide wood clapboard!
Right behind the Coast Guard house on the bay is an abandoned marina. You can see the remnants of the boardwalk that went from the main building and out to Chincoteague Bay.
As we walked down beside the boardwalk we ran into this piece of what looked like driftwood. When we got close enough to read the tags that are attached to it, we found out that it's part of one of the 200+ shipwrecks that happened off the coast of Assateague Island over the last several hundred years. On the tag was a way to log the find with the University of Florida, and a graduate student there sent me this information about the piece...
It is most likely a futtock (or rib) of a 19th early 20th century vessel. If you looked closely at the rib, you may have seen wooden dowels (or trunnels). These would have fastened the ship together.
Thanks, Austin Burkhard!
Next we took a short loop walk to see the 1833 Assateague Lighthouse. This was the first lighthouse constructed on the island. Needless to say, this lighthouse was placed to warn mariners away from these dangerous shoals.
We then drove around the beautiful marsh in the middle of the wildlife refuge and headed off towards Congaree, SC, which is our next National Park.
Needless to say these are not my photographs but I just wanted to give you an aerial view of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge–Tunnel. It is a 37 km long fixed link bridge at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay in Virginia. It's so large that I couldn't even find an aerial photograph of the entire bridge!
Now I didn't really want to give you an engineering lesson about the bridge, but I wanted you to understand that when our windshield wipers decided to lock in the up position, in the middle of a rainy night on this bridge, it's kind of a serious issue… luckily Mike got out at an emergency pull-off and beat on the motor with a screwdriver to fix the broken ground wire, and everything worked.... thank God he's handy...
I was so excited when I saw the sign I squeaked out loud. Any of you who have known me for a long time know that I have loved this place since I was in single digits and no one will ever go with me. I looked at Mike with those It's Valentine's Day eyes and he couldn't do anything but agree to take me.
I mean, how can you not wanna come here! It's the kitschiest, craziest place I've ever been in America and now Mike has gotten to share in its glory. Oh and another thing is that we got to make someone's day better just by stopping here. We picked up a hitchhiker and his puppy and took them to Florence, SC so he could hop the ISM rail to Savannah. We wish him happy trails and maybe we might catch up with him somewhere along the road.
So happy Valentine's Day to all of you out there at home from us in the Beaver Lodge. P.S. Mr. Camel wants to most especially wish Holly a happy Wednesday.
This is Congaree National Park. It is pretty far from almost anywhere, except Columbia, in South Carolina. It wasn't a park that made the original list but we are so glad that we went! There are so many interesting things about this National Park. If you've gone to as many as we have, you know that often the residents who live around the area are not in favor of protecting large tracts of land. This National Park only exists due to the unending effort of the people in the local community. They began the fight in the late 1960's and finally received National Park designation by Act of Congress in 2003. This may not seem important, but almost all National Parks are presidentially designated, not congressionally enacted. This National Park actually has a law standing behind it.
This park preserves the largest tract of old growth bottomland hardwood forest left in the United States. The trees that you will see here are some of the tallest in the Eastern United States. We know we're always going to lose the height battle to the Giant Sequoias, but these are no less impressive, growing 150+ feet and living 400 years. This forest forms one of the highest and largest temperate deciduous forests in the world.
We came to this remote part of the National Park by accident. We didn't know it at the time but this is the most recently created trail in the park. Unfortunately we didn't get very far in before we ran into a 6' barrier of water between us and the rest of the trail. So we turned around and headed towards the visitor center.
When we got there we were greeted with this unusual "clock" dial. Luckily the dial read one and it was extremely accurate.
The main, and by that I mean the most popular, walk in the park is along a boardwalk. Normally I am not tremendously fond of walks like this but in this environment it's extremely necessary. We got lucky because just 24 hours earlier it was completely covered in water. Also this boardwalk is 2.5 miles round trip. The boardwalk also allows you to access a lot of side trails that take you to less used parts of the park.
One of the upsides of doing the boardwalk walk is that the park provides a guide that tells you about what you're seeing. This is a Bald Cypress tree. This tree is unique in its species. The name "bald" is associated with it because, unlike most of the rest of its species, it drops its leaves in winter. These are small and young Cypress trees but they will grow to over 100' in maturity. Do you see the small protrusions above the marsh water? They are called Cypress knees. The precise function of these protrusions is unknown but scientists hypothesize that they are used to anchor the tree, aerate the tree, and reduce erosion.
The park also does a beautiful job making the trail accessible to people of all athletic abilities. They have benches at regular intervals that allow you to rest and just observe your beautiful surroundings.
After doing about a mile on the boardwalk we turned off and headed towards Wise Lake. This gave us an opportunity to see the Congaree Forest as it's meant to be. We ran into so many animals in this short 5-mile hike. We saw feral pigs, many woodpeckers, three white-tailed deer, fox squirrels and this guy -->
Do you know what animal this is? I'll only give you one clue... Our mascot wishes that he were this guy.
I've never seen one in the wild and this guy gave us an amazing performance!
We got to Congaree fairly late, so by the time we made it back to the visitors center it was dark. We've never been in a National Park that was so kind about letting us sleep in one remote section. It's the kind of place we expected to get woken up by a park ranger, but we didn't! This was perfect because we wanted to do a hike the next morning before heading off.
This was our lovely camp spot last night. In the morning we headed off on the King Snake Trail. Unfortunately we weren't lucky enough to see any actual King Snakes; wrong season.
Before we left on the king snake trail I found this guy chilling out in the bathroom. We picked him up because there's pretty much nothing for him to eat in there, and re-homed him to the forest. I love the fact that we were in snow last week and now there are beetles out this week!
Another great thing about this National Park is that they are amazing at blazing their trails. No one could possibly get lost, and even if you did they include geo location markers so if you had to call 911 you could tell them literally exactly where you are on the globe.
Sometimes when we were on the trail it almost felt like we were back in Pennsylvania. Mike missed the enormous deciduous trees when we were out West so I guess he's getting his fill now.
We crossed this paw print on our way back to the van. If you look closely, it's just to the right of Mike's foot, and we're not entirely sure what animal it belongs to. There are no claw marks above the pads, which generally rules out bears and anything in the genus Canis. It's quite large so we thought perhaps a puma/ Mountain lion ( Puma concolor ), but after some research we found that the State of South Carolina says that they don't exist here… I guess we'll never really know.
I included this picture because a special kind of Palmetto Palm lives in Congaree National Park. This is the type of Palm that is pictured on the South Carolina State flag and is the tree of South Carolina. Here in Congaree, since so little sun gets to the ground, they grow in a dwarfed variety.
I wasn't kidding when I said there was a lot of water in Congaree, but maybe I wasn't entirely clear about the fact that it was often times all over the trail.
This was the worst section that we had to cross over, and I'm proud to say that neither of us took a spill crossing the log. Everything in this world has a price. We had flooding, but no mosquitoes, and I think we had the better end of the deal.
In every relationship there has to be some blind trust. When I say I want to drive all the way across the State to a town that is just below Myrtle Beach, most would say why? But Mike simply said OK and drove me.
We got ridiculously lucky and got a campsite in Huntington State Park on Thursday and Friday of Presidents Day weekend. Not the same campsite, but for us moving is not exactly the biggest deal.
On Thursday Mike and I drove across the causeway to go up the bike trail.
Here are some photos from the causeway. There is high tide always on the left hand side but the right hand side fluctuates dramatically to create a beautiful mud flat where the birds love to come and feed.
We actually left the State Park to go geocaching.
I had found many of these before and was so excited to share them. Normally it's Mike sharing Geocaches with me, but this time it was my turn!
When we got to the end of the bike trail, we ran into this sign. I didn't realize they were trying to drill off South Carolina. Yet with our current president nothing should surprise me in this area should it.
Biking on the trail we almost ran over this ribbon snake. They are so many animals that live in this ecosystem and we are so grateful to Anna and Archer Huntington for buying and preserving this beautiful place.
Then it was back across the causeway to visit a ruin that made Huntington State Park possible.
This is Atalaya Castle, which is really just Atalaya. It was the winter home of industrialist/philanthropist Archer Huntington and his wife, Anna Hyatt Huntington.
Here is a view of their seaside home. Unfortunately you can't see the ocean now but when they lived here you could.
Archer designed it in the Moorish style. This tower held all of the water the household used. Because it was raised so high, it provided enough water pressure that the household could use it for daily chores like showers and laundry.
Anna was a beautiful sculptor. She made all of the wrought iron window and door coverings, as well as the railings in the household. The coloration of the ironwork is original to the household.
The house may just be a shell now, but you can feel the voices and spirits of Anna and Archer.
Here is a look out into the courtyard from the servants' quarters of the home. This house was built less than 100 years ago but they employed only local workers through the American depression while funding American sculpture and fine arts. We really enjoyed touring this house and then going back out on the beach for another romp.
We had the most wonderful beach walk. Mike had never seen a live Sand Dollar and we found two, as well as a beautiful piece of orange coral and a mussel. Don't worry, we threw them all back into the ocean together for a second go around. We hope they don't come back to the beach.
As you can tell, this morning was not quite as warm as yesterday... We went for another walk down the beach and found this tree. I couldn't help but tie another set of shells on its boughs. I guess it's a little good-bye before we head off to Charleston.
I was only in Charleston once before and didn't get to go to Fort Sumter, but this time I did! It's a beautiful national monument and it costs only $22 a person to take the ferry.
Here's a picture of the ferry with the Charleston bridge in the background. You would be surprised how many people they could squeeze onto this vessel. It was practically standing room only.
It takes about 30 minutes to get from Charleston to Fort Sumter. On the way out the seagulls followed us the entire way. We also got to see dolphins ushering us out of the Harbor.
When we booked the boat trip, I didn't know that the fort would be best viewed in the afternoon sun. Also I had no idea of the extent to which restorations were needed on the island. When you look at the diorama of the fort you will understand how much has not been restored.
As you can see in this reproduction, there are two levels of guns and three levels to the fort. In the current situation there is only one level restored.
Here is a photo of us in front of the entrance to Fort Sumter. You can see the gun holes behind us only rising one level above the ground. This was not true when the Fort was in use. It was actually three full floors high. I guess due to funds they didn't recreate the other floors of the fort. Almost everything that you'll see going forward is a reproduction because the Fort was bombed to rubble at the start of the Civil War.
These are the cannons that come through the holes that you saw in our previous selfie. They actually have an adopt-a-cannon program here because they are so expensive to acquire and upkeep. It would be very impressive to see this fort with all of its cannons intact.
The gun in the back of this photo is called a Rodman gun. It was designed by Union artilleryman Thomas Jackson Rodman and was designed to fire both shot and shell from seacoast fortifications like Fort Sumter. The one on display here is a 10-inch bore. Their design is very distinctive, with a curving bottle shape, large flat cascabels with ratchets or sockets for the elevating mechanism.
Here is a picture of how one of these guns would have been historically mounted. You may be wondering why I'm spending so much time talking about them, but they do have a very interesting feature. Unlike most guns, the Rodmans were hollow cast. This means that both the outside and the inside of the gun were cooled simultaneously during manufacture. The most important factor was that this allowed more gunpowder and stronger shells to be put down the barrel without the barrel splintering. Humans have always used their ingenuity to find better ways to blow each other up.
One of the cool things about the fort is that they've left some of the munitions where they "fell".
Here is a diorama showing the fort as it would have looked just before the first shots of the Civil War were fired at sunrise on April 12, 1861.
Here is a panoramic shot standing in front of the museum looking over what has been rebuilt of Fort Sumter. I have to say I wish I had seen it in its original condition.
If you ever get the opportunity to go to Fort Sumter may I suggest that you take the afternoon ferry. The lighting on the front of the fort as well as inside the fort is quite nice at this time of day.
On the way back on the ferry I finally got a decent picture of the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge. It is a cable-stayed bridge over the Cooper River and I loved this bridge so much the first time I was here I bought a Christmas ornament depicting it.
Once we got back into the city of Charleston the first thing I wanted to do was go for a walk on the pier. It's about two tenths of a mile long and right in the heart of the historic district.
It doesn't hurt that it's also 2/10 of a mile from my favorite Charleston pub. The Griffon is one of those quirky places where you staple dollar bills onto the walls. It would be fun to know how much there is.
After the Griffon we headed back to the van to have dinner and just relax. As you can see, we parked ourselves in a great neighborhood where we were not worried about leaving the Beaver Lodge.
Sometimes it's difficult to understand why one would want to see more than one Fort, especially when the first one is Fort Sumter. This Fort, which is previously unknown to me, is the only National Park where one can visit the entire 171-year history (1776-1947) of American seacoast defense.
Fort Moultrie is not solely relegated to this small area, but is a series of fortifications on Sullivan's Island SC. It is the companion fort to Fort Sumter, built to protect Charleston and Charleston Harbor. This fort also hides a second secret. It was origionally constructed of palmetto logs, and inspired the flag and nickname of South Carolina as "The Palmetto State".
It is hard to tell from this panoramic photo but the fort is actually divided up to represent each of its major stages of American maritime fortification that took place here. The section that I'm standing in and taking the photo from, is the World War I section. On the left is the Revolutionary and Civil War sections and on the right is the World War II section.
Here is a photo of Mike standing in front of a Box that used to house signal flags. This fort has some really interesting pieces still remaining intact .
One feature is the flag that was flying at half mast due to the massacre in Florida. This is the 15-Star Flag (1795-1818). It has two additional stars and two additional stripes, one for Kentucky and one for Vermont. I'm not sure I've actually ever seen it flying.
Here is Mike looking through another cannon. This is also in the World War I section.
Then we came upon 2 more Rodman guns! These ones are larger than the ones at Fort Sumter, 15-inch here.
Then we walked past another section that showed how hard people had to work to keep gunpowder safe during the Revolutionary and Civil War periods.
This is just an example of the beautiful architecture that has been maintained all around the city of Charleston.
I know there is controversy over horse-drawn carriages in major cities, but for some reason in the south they seem to have their place. We didn't engage in one of the tours but I guess that's just not our style.
One of the last things that I wanted to see before we left Charleston was Rainbow Row. This is an incredible row of beautifully painted and maintained houses that extends from the historic district all the way to White Point Garden, a park at the confluence of the Ashley and Cooper Rivers.
Oh wait, one more thing before we leave... I missed the historic Charleston City Market the last time I was here. But this time we walked all the way through the 6 or 7 blocks. It was really fun to see all of the beautiful handmade goods that Charleston produces.
It's kind of amazing that Mike had things on the calendar to do in the American South-East, because we'd pretty much decided not to come here. But it's terribly lucky that he did because if not we may never have found Angel Oak.
This tree is a Southern live oak, Quercus virginiana. These trees have some truly remarkable properties that so many others have not acquired. For instance if they are planted within a distance of each other they will join roots and share water and nutrients between each other in lean times. I guess that makes sense for a tree that can live upwards of 1,000 years.
The tree is named for the estate of Justus Angel and his wife, Martha Waight Tucker Angel. It is estimated to be 400-500 years old, stands 20 m tall, measures 8.5 m in circumference, and produces shade that covers 1,600 m2. This may not seem so significant, but enormous tracts of land in this area have been logged and only replaced with small pine trees. This beautiful hardwood tree is truly unique in its current environment.
After seeing Angel Oak we continued South and stumbled upon this lovely roadside store. Lucky for us they advertised their cider for almost five miles beforehand. We got some blueberry cider and got back on the road. It was well worth the stop here for this delicious juice.
Once again the Beaver Lodge map comes in handy. This is a place that was marked as a maybe-some-day, except here we are! It crosses the border between South Carolina and Georgia but protects 118 km² of National Wildlife Refuge. Most of it is inaccessible due to the fact that it is inundated with water.
This might seem like a silly or trite comment to make, but the amount of water in each of the "paddies" is very strictly controlled by the National Park Service. Each area specifically caters to a specific type of bird or amphibian or fish or reptile. Some of these sections contain more than 1000 ducks... trust me, when you see the area you can't imagine this many bodies living in one area, but they do.
This particular picture may not seem special to everyone but it was the first time that Mike had seen an American alligator in the wild! This was a particularly beautiful specimen as he was about 6' long.
We so enjoyed this 10km drive. There is such a mix of flora and fauna here.
Clearly the local community also supports this area because this bird line was built by a local boy scout troop.
Sorry, I guess I need a second picture of the Spanish moss hanging on all of the deciduous trees.
Thes sign says it all... Welcome to Georgia! The only time that Mike and I have been here is to get on the Appalachian Trail. Too bad it's so far away or possibly we would have made a visit for posterity.
The only thing that I've ever been told about Savannah is that they have the most beautiful squares every few blocks in the downtown area. This is an example of one of them that a lovely grandmother at the welcome center told us was her favorite.
The problem with the South is that you can't hate their cities! There are so many beautiful streets and they're actually not as ridiculously crowded as they would be up North. Here is one residential street right in the heart of Savannah.
Savannah also has a plethora of beautiful churches. This one just happens to be my favorite; it is the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. It is amazing that this cathedral even exists, because the British did not allow Catholics to have churches in Spanish-influenced areas. Luckily, shortly after the American revolution this church was begun.
Here is one of the side chapels off the main altar. I cannot possibly do Justice to the Stations of the Cross that are presented on all of the side walls of this cathedral. You're just going to have to come and see them for yourself.
We spent a lot of miles walking around Savannah past dozens and dozens of squares. Then we came upon Forsyth Park. It is a beautiful place that the citizens of Savannah use to their best advantage. We saw people on blankets and people walking and people riding bikes. Remember it is still February. I guess I wouldn't want to be here in August, but February is beautiful.
Just out from the park we ran into the Savannah cemetery. The Historic Society has done an amazing job putting up signposts so that you know what is going on with the major gravesites. This was my favorite.
After we left the park, we passed by a macaroon bakery. I gasped and said let's go get some! Mike said OK. Only later did I realize…
He had never had a macaroon. Here is a picture of his very first bite... don't worry, this wasn't his last. We both got to pick 3 for a total of six. I'll give you a guess what I chose and what he chose, but here was the final list.
Snickers
Bananas Foster
Red Velvet
Mexican Custard
Passion Fruit Berry
Green Tea
This beautiful Green Anole watched us eat our macaroons. Sadly we don't feed wildlife. No problem because he probably wasn't so interested in our sweets anyway.
After walking across the city and seeing their beautiful parks, we took up the advice of our original grandmother guide and went to the arts district for dinner.
When we were there we saw the modern container ship pass the antiquated one. Neither Mike nor I have ever seen a Georgia paddle boat go down the river, but we did see it in dock.
OK I know it's another fort, but trust me this one was really amazing. I've never seen anything like it and I'm so glad that we came.
My first impression was that this is a medieval fort. Why is there a moat? Why is there a drawbridge? Is there a Renaissance Faire somewhere in the area? Except this is how the Fort was designed in the 1700's. When you look at it you think there's a moat, the walls are so high and there's no land anywhere near it; it's practically impregnable. But the Union did manage to do some significant damage that you'll see later.
Here is a picture of the fort from an aerial view on one of their postcards. My photos can only do justice to one side at a time, but this tells you what it would look like if you could see it all together.
Here is a better look at the moat. It is 37 to 42' wide at any given area. This is no joke.
Now this particular room in the Fort is extremely interesting. There are no other examples of these devices available for view. These two items were used to pick up cannons over 4,000 pounds and move them around. Visitor donations at the visitors center raised enough money to buy these from private owners. I'm so glad that they are in the public trust because where else could you see this?
Here is a view of the fort from left to right at the top parapet. I know it doesn't look like much now but this Fort was hard won by the Union during the Civil War. In the photo, not the next but the one after, you will see damage to the outside of the fort. It was inflicted from an island that was almost two miles away. The Confederacy didn't believe that the Union had the ability to damage a fort at such a distance with such accuracy, but they could and they did.
On our way out of the Fort to walk the loop, a volunteer asked if we would like to see the back of the main moat doors. I said sure, and this is what he displayed to us. Look at the beautiful copper patina on the back of the doors.
After that we circumnavigated the fort and got to see the full force of the Union damage that is remaining. Another interesting fact is that the Union tried to get the Confederacy to cede the fort, but the Union was more than 2 miles away and the Confederates didn't think they had the accuracy to shell Ft. Pulaski. I think that this wall shows differently. There are nine munitions left visible in the external walls shown. We only managed to find two but it is amazing to see these remnants of the past.
Just across from the fort there was the lovely Tybee Island lighthouse. It's operated by the area's historic society. Unfortunately we didn't have time to visit the museum.
As you travel around the country, each area of the United States has things that are going to surprise and amaze you. The American South-East has hurricane warnings out the wazoo. This is just one of them. And if you're wondering, that is a fort on the right hand side of the photograph. Not Fort Pulaski, but one on Tybee Island.
The Okefenokee Swamp is a shallow (less than 2 m in most places), 1,770 km² , peat-filled wetland. It runs along the Florida–Georgia border and despite its name most of the wetland is a bog, not a swamp, and Okefenokee is the largest "blackwater" swamp in North America. The etymology of the name is confusing. It is often translated as "the land of trembling earth," but more recent translations state that it is most likely derived from Hitchiti oki fanôːki which means "bubbling water". When you see the photographs that are to come you can decide which translation you think better fits the place.
Of course there's no real hiking in the swamp so we rented a double kayak for the day. If you look at the photograph, you can really see how dark the water is. In fact there's almost nowhere that you can see down to the bottom.
The swamp is actually used for many things other than just kayaking. Just on the right hand side you can see a wooden structure that people were fishing off as we paddled by. Also if you look at the sky you can see that we got a perfect day; just a little bit of clouds and they protected us from the very hot sun.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RazNIJ_qAYs
This is our Close Encounter of the Alligator Kind.
There are not very many structures in the swamp because almost everything that will look like solid land is actually floating peat, even the stuff that the trees are growing out from. This is the only toilet in the entire swamp that is not attached to a camping area. I was amazed that these toilets work very much like the ones on land. They allow water decomposers rather than land ones to break down waste.
Also, because there is so little solid land, many animals congregated around this floating "island". This little guy is a Southern Cricket Frog, Acris gryllus. He was really tiny; about the size of my thumb, maybe a little bigger.
We also spotted this beautiful fishing spider. It is from the genus Dolomedes which is a family of large fishing or raft spiders. They will eat pretty much anything they can catch: small fish, other spiders, and things as large as a full grown Anole... that is the green lizard that I previously showed you in Savannah. No that wasn't a small lizard; this is just a very big spider.
We spent the majority of the day without seeing anyone. It's good that we weren't here over Presidents weekend because the outfitter was so busy they had to bring in their backup kayaks. I can't imagine being out here and having a fight to kayak around other people.
It's fascinating how there are so many different types of ecosystems in the swamp. A lot of the accessible areas are the big wide open waterways that you saw in the first photos, but that only exists because a logging company created them when they were trying to drain the swamp to make removing timber easier. Thankfully they failed but left behind these easy-to-maintain channels.
This section of this swamp is called a prairie. It's just like the prairies in middle America but all the grass is growing on peat rafts in the water. It would be a woeful mistake to try to get out and walk on any of the grass, because your weight would push it under water.
Hey you can see who does all the hard work in a kayak! It might be called a double kayak, but only one of us did the paddling😂
In the early afternoon, all of the turtles appear seemingly out of nowhere. They sit and sun themselves on the peat raft, getting warm enough to get back in the water and go fishing for dinner.
Not too far from this sign I thought that Mike was going to push me into the canal for sheer idiocy. We saw this very large 11' or 12' alligator slip into the water ahead of us. It disappeared under the water and so I kept paddling. Mike told me to stop and give the alligator some room.... I said he's totally gone already, just keep going. As I was finishing that sentence and looking into the water, all I could see under the kayak was an eye and a paw. If Mike had paddled the kayak, he would have hit the gator directly in the head. Mike always gets so smug when he's right.
Here is a photograph of a similarly sized alligator... I guess Mike did have a little bit of justification for his grumpiness.
Mike and I talked about actually camping in the swamp, but unfortunately all of the campsites that we could reach were already taken. But I thought that you might all be intrested in seeing what a campsite in a swamp would look like. I was particularly taken by the fact that they have a covered area. Fair-skinned people like me really appreciate considerations like that.
When we got back to shore, Mike thought he would demonstrate how to wrestle an alligator. Guess it's best that he did it to this one and not one of those in the swamp.
It might seem odd that the National Park Service would do prescribed burns in a swamp, but swamps burn just as easily as forests. In April of 2017, 225 mile² of swamp burned. To give you an idea of how large that is, most counties in Georgia are smaller than this burned area. It took 725 firefighters to finally contain the burn.
Another aspect to this park is that they have tried to preserve the pioneering spirit that first brought people to this swamp. This is the Obediah Barber Homestead. It was built in 1870 and is near the northern edge of the Okefenokee Swamp. The family that lived here farmed sugarcane and made syrup. They also made extra money by tapping the pines and distilling it down to turpentine.
I have to say I had never seen a sugarcane press before, but there is one on the property. Horses or mules would be hooked to each end of the long Pole to turn the crushing gears that are in the center. Everything that is at the Homestead is still functional.
Even the furnishings inside are original to the period. They have been donated by the local historic society because most of these cabins have fallen into disrepair and been reclaimed by the swamp.
One of the nicest walks in the park is along a boardwalk that is just above the swamp. It is a one-and-a-half-mile round trip hike that really allows you to get up close and personal with the swamp.
As Mike and I traversed it, we wondered how many man hours it took them to build it. This walk takes you along the path of the original boardwalk which was lost in the 2007 Big Turnaround Fire. It ends up at our 90-foot observation tower that gives you a look over the Chester prairie.
Here's a picture of what the actual boardwalk looks like. It's built out of Trex in the hope that when the next fire comes through it will survive. This new boardwalk even has its own fire suppression system. I can only imagine what the cost of replacing it was.
We're going to end this blog with a funny story. First let me tell you why we ended up parking here to begin with. The area around Okeefenokee swamp is not exactly tourist-friendly. Pretty much every scrap of land has No Trespassing postings and gated driveways with signs reading Private Property - Stay Out. To make matters worse, all of the roads in the area are packed sand with soft berms. There was really not anywhere for us to park. We drove down miles and miles of roads that are not even marked on Google, to no avail. We thought we were going to have to go back to the main road and simply park on a pull-off and hope for the best. Then we found the Johnson graveyard. We stayed there on the first night without any trouble. This gave us hope... false hope, but hope nonetheless.
So on the second night, around midnight, we get a knock on the side of the Van. So Mike gets up and meets Sheriff Floyd. He tells us that in Georgia you're not allowed to park in graveyards. So Mike asks him where we can go. He says the boat launch. Now this is absurd to us because we generally found that if you want to be almost guaranteed to get kicked out of an area at best, or arrested at worst, try parking by a boat launch overnight. Floyd tells Mike that he's the only guy on duty in the County tonight and he won't bother us none.
So off we go to the boat launch, where we meet Dave and his girlfriend, who is now affectionately known as Velvet Onesie. I'm only giving you one guess what she was wearing. So when we pulled into the boat launch parking lot, Dave drove up and said "You can't park here!" We were surprised because the Sheriff told us it's OK. Dave said "Can't you see the donuts all over the ground? If you park here they'll run you down." At that exact moment the Sheriff drove into the parking lot... Dave, our new friend, calls out "Floyd, Floyd, get over here and meet these people." I felt the need to step up and say, "Hi, I'm sorry we didn't meet you in the graveyard but I'm pleased to meet you now." We then spent the next hour hanging out with the townies and the Sheriff at the boat launch. You can't make up this stuff.
