Our Florida escape

We have escaped Florida! It’s funny how you get into a mode and then one day you wake up and you are not there anymore, in thought process or manner. We never seems to get an early start and the result of which is we made it out of Florida but not far. Our first stop was Crooked River State park on our march up the sea coast. It feels good to out of Florida but the landscape hasn’t changed enough for us to know. The bugs are moving north too, much to Mark’s chagrin. On our way to Savanna we stopped at San Simon Island lighthouse which was Mariah’s first lighthouse. It turns our that all southern coastal states have barrier island and so there are lighthouses all up the coast and we are all going to be experts on Fresnal (pronounced fre-nel) lenses by the end of this trip. Mariah was so inspired by the trip that she wrote a song and we are looking forward to the learning experience that goes with copywriting a song.
We spent the night at a park called Fort McAllister which was just south of Savanna. Fort McAllister was the first earthen fort of the civil war that was used by the confederates and union as a testing grounds for defense against modern (of the day) armaments. It was supposed to guard the backdoor of Savanna from blockade runners. The union sent it’s ironclads up the Ocheebee river to see if the fort could withstand it’s guns and it did. The sturdier masonary forts would blow apart but with earthen bulwarks the damage inflicted could be fixed overnight and also would absorb the impact of the blast. We spent our first but certainly not our last day learning about the country most significant time.
We went to Savanna for a day and it was interesting the way the city was laid out and the influence of cotton as a mainstay of it’s economy. The historic district has little plaza’s everywhere that give it a park feel and each of those are surrounded by very old masonary houses. The rest of it is just big, old city. There is a very exciting college there called Savannah College of Art and Design and the students were everywhere with their art supplies making paintings and drawings. The river area is very old and is home to the Savannah Cotton Exchange which if you read “Big Cotton”, a fascinating book about the influence of cotton on world events, it is a reverent spot.
Carolina on my mind….We are in South Carolina now near a town called Beaufort and this more my style. Another town spared by Sherman it is small and has all the charm one would expect from a town this size. They are going through a river revitalization project and are doing a fantastic job. Lots of antebellum houses with the basement slave quarters that have been restored. We spent our first part at a popular park called Huntington Beach which is way out on a barrier island. You feel like you are driving for miles to get there and think no one else must know about this place and you get the last spot available at a campground that holds 200 people. It too had a light house that we toured with our friend Bill who came to join us. It has been his life goal to climb it and he finally got to with us. The diameter of this lighthouse was much bigger that the ones we have climbed and much taller. The view as usual was spectacular.
The exterior color scheme and unique flashing light pattern of the various lighthouses can tell a sailor his location and he can go to a book and find out what the local hazards are. This seems antiquidated by modern standards but if the satellites go out there will many a boatman who will be glad that the lighthouses are still around. Mark and I read an interesting book by Jimmy Buffet called A Salty Bit of Land that involves the restoring of lighthouse so it fun to actually see all the items talked about in the book.
The music continues to light up our life. Olivia is further inspired by the patterns given to us by Joe from the Florida House Inn and we are having fun keeping people up at night in the campgrounds. Hugs to all, The Meanderthals