St. Augustine and Savannah, April 2008
Thursday 04.24.08:
On Thursday morning we woke up and were going to take advantage of the continental breakfast at the Hilton. Surprisingly the continental breakfast that they served versus the one the Hilton in St. Augustine serve are quite different. We decided to grab the car and head down to the Riverwalk to hit the Cobblestone Cafe.
Ana did try some grits, but that's definitely not a choice food for her. Otherwise she had a Greek Omelet that she said was terrific. I had eggs, sausage patties and a bagel. Not a bad start to the day at all.
I took a few shots of the Tallmadge Bridge and of the Riverwalk while I was there:
Here is a shot of the Savannah River Queen, a boat we would ride up and down the river after lunch, some traffic on the river, and a Coast Guard helicopter
From here we ventured out to Bonaventure Cemetery, more so just to say we had been there. We saw a few of the headstones of the characters from "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" but were disappointed to learn the Bird Girl Statue was no longer in the cemetery.
From here we headed back to the Hotel and around to some of the other areas around the hotel we wanted to see. We stopped and took some shots here and there:
Here are some shots of (insert church name here):
This church was rather stunning, but they had some sort of event going on which kept us from taking a peek inside.
From here walked back down toward the Riverwalk, making a detour through the city market. We saw the ridiculous lines at Paula Dean's restaurants, that must be some dam fancy cooking to be that popular. The City Market was pretty tiny, and was more of a tourist trap then a market. So much for fresh foods.
For lunch we stopped at B&D Burger's, a little college burger joint, but nothing special. The hot dog I had was ok, nothing special, and Ana said her burger wasn't that great either.
Afternoon tour!
We plunked down our $19 each to take a cruise up and down the Savannah River on the Savannah River Queen. I can gladly say it was well worth the money. The captain did a fine job narrating our voyage and telling us about many interesting historic and current events to take place along the river.
Here are a few shots from the cruise:
Savannah City Hall's gold dome,
I then spotted this creature (is this the famous "skunk ape" with a guitar?):
Shots of the Tallmadge Bridge:
My that's a big crane :)
From here we strolled back towards our hotel. I wanted to stop and take a picture of Chippewa Square, which is where Forrest Gump was filmed for the most part.
Here is where the famous bench "was" as they removed it to put in a museum:
Ana also grabbed the camera for a few and took some great shots:
Shopping:
Simply Irresistible Home Accents, 15 York Street (Washington Square).
This place was absolutely beautiful. The had a collection of the Lolita Pilsner, Martini and Wine Glasses. There were many eclectic and modern style accents that would be beautiful in any home. The owner was from Ft. Lauderdale himself, and was very kind and warm. Stop by if you are in Savannah.
From here we went back to the hotel to get cleaned up for dinner.
Dinner:
(note I did not take the above picture, only included for reference.)
We had stopped this morning and asked the Concierge to get us a reservation here and he did so without a problem. A hint about this place is that if you want to get eating on time, go before 6:30 and you'll be in just fine. The food here is AMAZING! This house is also the oldest house in Georgia.
First Jeremy, our waiter brought out biscuits and cornbread. You will not find a better biscuit anywhere. They are smaller than usual but its probably better that way so you don't gorge yourself on these tasty southern style delights. The cornbread came out as small mini-cupcake sized bites. They were sweeter than most cornbread you find in the south but still a delight none the less. At this point Jeremy brought out a Pino Grigio that would be an absolute perfect match to the main course.
For the appetizer we ordered the hush puppies with crab meat. Again, these were absolutely amazing, and were small so that you were full of bread before your entree arrived. Ana order a crab bisque that rivaled that bisque we had up in Portland Maine last year.
After about 25 minutes our entree's arrived. Ana had a salad that had fried goat cheese, a champagne vinagrette and walnuts that she said was better than any salad she had ever eaten. I had a pan seared flounder with an apricot reduction, and a rice and beans side dish. It also came with collard greens, but I am not too partial to those, although Ana said they were quite good.
For dessert I had the chocolate pecan pie with vanilla ice cream, and Ana had vanilla ice cream that inlcuded blueberries, strawberries, a pecan and almond shell, and was covered in an apricot glaze with a chocolate sauce dripped over that.
Our total bill with 30% gratuity was still under $130 and quite honestly, probably the best meal I have ever eaten.
Once we were finished we had to move along because we had an 8pm reservation with the Savannah Creepy Crawly Ghost Tour.
Entertainment!
Creepy Crawly Ghost Pub Crawl ph 912-238-3843
Disclaimer. Before you read the following and perhaps get scared, goose bumps or any of that, some of what experienced, or external links to others experience could be alarming. If you choose to skip this, click here to go to the last page.
The ghost tour starts off at the SIXPENCE pub on Bull and Perry Lane. I have been on this exact tour before, and I wasn't going to miss seeing it again. Savannah is an open container city (within the historic district) so you can actually take one for the road.
At any rate we walked across through Chippewa Square, down Hull Street and down to Colonial Park Cemetery. Here Greg explained how during the civil war, the Union forces set up shop in the cemetery and defaced many grave stones, as well as removed and destroyed many of them as well. Apparently at this time, the cemetery used to extend out to where present day Abercom Street is. Unfortunately since there was much destruction of records during the war, there is also no record of who was buried where, so there are still remains possibly buried under the highway.
From here we strolled down to the 17Hundred90 bed and breakfast / pub and entered our first bar.
This is one of my favorite bar's in Savannah, it is small and quiet and they close up shop early since they are a bed and breakfast. It is said that this is one of the most haunted places in Savannah, with freakish occurrences in room 204 happening quite regularly. Long story short, a girl name Ana was forced into an arranged marriage by the old man who was the owner of what was then a boarding house in the late 1700's. Ana was forced into marriage by this man so that he would have someone to go to the port and review the ships who were docking paperwork. After a few years (she would be about 12 or 13 when the marriage was arranged) she met a young sailor whose ship was damaged at sea. As things happen they fell in love. When it came time to depart, the plan was for the girl to leave with the young sailor to escape to a better life. As things would be the old man found out and beat her to death in room 204 and then tossed her broken body out into the street, claiming she had committed suicide. Those who stay in this room have had some wild experiences. Take a look at some of these stories (you'll need to scroll about 1/2 way down the page to get to them)...
Ok, now that you're freaked out, we finished up our drinks and headed down to a bar named WG's which is at 17 Lincoln Street, which is a few blocks North of the 17Hundred90. WG stands for the current owner's name. This was a small bar, couldn't hold more than 50 people comfortably. The story in this pub is that a husband poisoned his wife by painting a poison around the rim of her wine glass. After doing so, he decided he did not want her to die, but she had already drank the wine. The man allegedly hung himself afterwards. During the 1920's the female ghost returned the favor to a married man who lived at this house, and it was done in the same fashion. The story also says that this occurred again in the 1950's, but nothing has happened in this house since then. I guess I will skip having the wine here!
From WG's we headed down to Moon River Brewing Company on West Bay Street. This by far is one of the creepiest places I have ever been. I remembered when I was here with the group from Sunshine MINI's a few years back. This place started life as the City Hotel back in the 1820's. A man died here as a result of dual between two men. The tour guide Greg had suggested that this was one of the most haunted places in Savannah. He mentioned that several visionaries and other ghost experts stated that there were many spirits in this place, especially in the second floor, back left room.
What is really creepy about this was that in May 2006 you could go into this room, I personally felt cold spots, and there were many photos taken with Orbs. Mind you I did not know any of this information the first time I was in this building. This time was not as bad, I did not feel any "presence" but Ana just said the 2nd floor just felt funny as many of the others reported. The owners report that they could not keep staff on hand when they opened for business because when employees would go to the basement, they would come out terrified and refuse to come back.
Now that you read my story, read this, then check out these pictures my friend Alex took while we were there in May of 2006...
Ok, from here we walked next door to Churchill's Pub.
This is likely the prettiest bar one could ever belly up to and apparently has some of the best food in the city, although we didn't try this part. The only information I could find on this pub being haunted is in regard to someone being hung at Churchill's, which coincides with the story Gregg told, albeit, I had consumed about 4 whisky and cokes over the last 2 hours.
At this point the tour was over, we tipped Greg and headed back to the SIXPENCE for a last bite to eat.