Savannah creeps up on you slowly. You can be out in the middle of nowhere-ville Georgia tidal country, and half an hour down a two-lane highway later, big houses and Spanish moss are flanking the car doors on either side. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil made this city famous, and one can see why. One block in and you're practically walking on the pages themselves, descriptive words flying around at every turn. From the antiqued green fountains anchoring every square to the Southern mansions holding down the perimeters, this city drips old world Southern charm. Throw in the Savannah river, a brick walk along side, some quaint tourist trap shops and seafood restaurants, and the image is complete. Sprinkled with the occasional Jimmy Buffet cover artist of course.
Henry Ford had a plantation here that is simply beautiful and sizably ostentatious, and I was told that Juliet Gordon Low's house was a teensy bit scandalous due to her having placed her garden in the front yard. Everyone knows that when you work in the garden, menfolk can see your wrists, and that's just a bit too risqué. I can't find supporting information anywhere on the internet however, so that could be either accurate or inaccurate history. Bygones. At the very least, it's an interesting tidbit.
St. Augustine teeters on the edge of the Floridian coast and the Atlantic Ocean like a stepchild left behind by father Europe. It holds tenuously to the mainland by a recently rebuilt bridge, modeled to look like the original with sentineled lampposts piercing the blue sky. The streets wind gently around Flagler College: a magnificent old world hotel still boasting columns of dark oak and a shiny entryway tiled with the cocoa browns, burnt oranges, and rusty reds of the early Spanish settlers.
The gardens are immaculately groomed; reds and purples and yellows bursting from behind neatly trimmed box hedges while the glossy palm trees babysit the downtown area, placating the steaming sidewalks outside of luxurious art galleries. Although the town itself is rather humble beyond its Spanish architecture, I imagine the older rich come here to vacation and acquire rare pieces they simply must have on display in their homes. For the more middle class are the alleys built to be tourist traps: chinky shops, the oldest house and oldest school room, the festival where everyone dresses like a pirate - not that there's anything wrong with that. I can imagine grown men wearing eye patches galavanting along the stone walls of the old fort, shooting off imaginary cannons over the port, looking out for a splash and a hit. To each their own, I suppose. I, for one, am quite enamored of the place.
