We’re in New Bern, North Carolina

 

Sunday, May 23, 2010                                                                                                 Lorraine’s report

Last Sunday, we were in Titusville, Florida. I tried to go to church at the Great Outdoors Church, but misunderstood the sign in front. I thought it said services at 9 and 10:15, but it said service was from 9 to 10:15, so I just caught the last part of the service.

From there we decided to make it a slower day and drove north on A1A to explore Merritt Island. We chose a beautiful day for the drive; it was in the mid 80’s, very few clouds in a beautiful, blue sky. We found Merritt Island full of people enjoying the beaches and plenty of different kinds of birds. All in all it was a wonderful day.

We left the Space Coast in Florida on Monday morning and went to Hardeeville RV Park which is just outside of Savannah, GA. We set up, did laundry, Chuck washed bugs from the windshield; then studied brochures on what to see and do in Savannah. Talk about a bunch of stuff to do for just about anyone or anything you like.

Tuesday we were up and off to take the Old Town Trolley Tour of Savannah. We lucked out and had a wonderful tour driver named Hollywood. He really made our tour fun, singing, telling us wonderful stories of the history of Savannah; we stayed the whole way through the entire tour, then started over and got off at his suggested places to go.

We saw and heard about the Andrew Low House, the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, the City Market, the First African Baptist Church, the Juliet Gordon Low, founder of the Girl Scouts of America, her birthplace and home, the Telfair Academy and so much more. We saw various types of architecture, such as Colonia, Federal Style, Greek Revival, and English Regency, just to name a few. We learned that showing of a lady’s ankle was a no-no so proper homes had two staircases in them, one for men to climb and the other strictly for women. The Catholic Church was a beautiful place to see.

Following our tour, we went home, took Misty out, then headed out to Tybee Island to see and walk in the Atlantic Ocean. Tybee Island was a small island filled with beautiful homes, condos and apartments. To go to the beach you had to pay at the meter for the amount of time you were going to stay, 24/7 365 days a year; the same for shopping in town. There were lots of people shopping and at the beach.

Dinner was at the Crab Shack, where I tried the Lowland Boil, which is prawns, crawdads, mussels, shrimp, Jonah Crab, Snow Crab, sausage, corn and potatoes, all served on a big platter; it was a good food following a great day.

Wednesday we left Savannah and went on into Hollywood, SC which is by Charleston, SC to the Lake Aire RV Park. Same routine, Chuck washed the front end, top and windshield, I fixed dinner.

Thursday Chuck finished washing the coach. I did laundry; then we went into Charleston, stopping at a Welcome Center. We discovered we could get 3 attraction tickets from a guy there if we went to a travel club presentation of approximately one hour. We signed up, chose our attractions and off we went to the presentation. Of course we told them “No” at the presentation, collected our tickets and started using the free tickets for the tours.

The first tickets got us on a Carriage tour of Old Charleston. The driver was well informed and knew his stuff. We didn’t know that the city of Savannah charged $.50 per person, plus $3.00 per buggy each time they took people out for a tour, and that they had 3 different routes to take tourists on, and they used a lottery system each tour. Fortunately, we drew Old Town and the Harbor. It was very warm and our buggy was crowded, 13 on board. We learned a lot about Charleston, or on a sign we saw, Chuck Town, saw historical homes, churches, squares, and oak trees with Spanish Moss hanging from them.

From there we were right by the Market; this is where slaves who worked on the plantations went to sell their wares, made on the plantations, with their owner’s blessings. We enjoyed looking through the market.

Charleston is where you go to get your Sweet Grass baskets. The coiled sweet grass basket is a historically significant example of African Cultural heritage that was brought by the slaves when they came across the ocean. Sweet grass basket weaving was considered a gift from God. The craft was handed down from generation to generation and is usually learned in childhood. Basket makers pledge to continue their traditional craft making as long as there are materials available to use.

Friday we were up early again headed for our second tour, Ft. Sumter. This tour involved catching a ferry boat that took you out into the bay to the island Ft. Sumter is on. It is about a 35 minute ferry ride. We took the noon boat. It was pretty crowded, not only with tourists, with lots of school children. But the day was warm, around 90 by noon with humidity about 50-60%. The Cooper River was calm, with a slight breeze blowing, the skies a nice blue.

Ft. Sumter was held by the Union at the entrance of Charleston harbor. When the South demanded that the north vacate Ft. Sumter, the North refused. South Carolina, which was the first state to leave the union and become part of the Confederacy, finally fired on Ft. Sumter on April 12, 1861. This started a two day bombardment that resulted in the surrender of the fort by the Union troops. This was the start of the Civil War.

During that time the fort was under siege for almost 2 years. 46,000 shells, estimated at more than seven million pounds of metal were fired at Ft. Sumter. Most of the fort was reduced to rubble from 5 foot thick walls. For those reasons and more, Ft. Sumter remains one of the most significant historic monuments in US History.

Following that tour we went home, took Misty out, then headed back out. Our destination was the Magnolia Plantation and Garden tour, the third free ticket. The Magnolia Plantation has been in one family, the Drayton family continuously since 1676. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

We arrived in time to take the narrated 4:30 tour of the big house. The guide was full of information about the times, the customs, the land, etc. We then wandered out into the gardens. There were not many flowers blooming, just lots of green leaves, green algae on the water, green trees, all pretty, but not we expected. We were disappointed.

Saturday we left Charleston and headed to Myrtle Beach, SC. Myrtle Beach was full of people, there was some sort of old car rally going on. I couldn’t believe the number of hotels there were on the beach. Of course, I had to put my feet into the water again. It sure is warm water compared to the Pacific.

So that takes us to today, we left Myrtle Beach and headed to New Bern, NC, the Moon Lake RV Park.

Until next time….Lorraine

5/23/2010                                                                                                                        Chuck’s report

Boy what a week!  Seems like we’ve been touring cities and learning history continuously, so much so that it all runs together.  We visited Savannah and Charleston, both are very fine cities with Charleston being the big brother, so to speak.  Both towns have lots of history, going all the way back to before the Revolutionary War.  What with war, fires, earthquakes and hurricanes, most of the really old building are gone.  We took tours in both cities and the facts, figures and dates are sort of scrambled around inside my head.  I will not attempt to discuss all those, I hope Lorraine does so in her report. 

On Monday we left Titusville, having been there a week.  When we roughly planned our itinerary for this portion of our trip, we didn’t know about the space shuttle launch and didn’t have any time scheduled for it.  But we really wanted to see a launch and figured we would cut short some of our time in other places here in the East.  

We wanted to visit Savannah and found a nice campground just North of city in Hardeeville, SC.  We also drove over to Tybee Island one afternoon.  We really only had a day and a half here before we left on Wednesday to Charleston, SC so we were on the go most of the time. 

When we got to our campground in Charleston I was able to wash to coach, it has been awhile and it was pretty dirty.  We stayed here three days and once again we were on the go for two of those days. 

On Saturday we headed to Myrtle Beach, SC and were only there for the one day.  Now no one can say they’ve toured and seen Savannah, Charleston and Myrtle Beach in a week, we are no exception.  We really enjoyed our time in South Carolina and hope to return for a more lengthy stay sometime in the future. 

We had an unusual, at least for us, travel day today, Sunday.  We are going to stay in New Bern tomorrow to see what we can before heading out on Tuesday morning.  About all I know about New Bern is Pepsi Cola was invented here.  There is also lots of history we will be checking out here, there were some major Civil War battles in the area.  So another busy day for tomorrow for us.   

From here we are planning on one day stop in Virginia Beach, Virginia then we are going to Gloucester, VA. for a two week stay over Memorial Day and the following week.  After that, we plan on heading to Washington DC for our first visit there.  So we will be doing more touring and exploring in the next three weeks, although not as fast as this week was for us however. 

The weather has been just short of fabulous, a bit warmer than I would like, getting into the 90s most days.  And the humidity is high, seems like I break a sweat just walking.  But, I will take this over the weather back in Washington this time of the year, some days their highs are only in the 50s and they just had a big winter type wind storm.  I’ll take the 90s with a cool breeze. 

And now for some pictures, culled from the 1000 that Lorraine took this week. 

The waving girl on the banks of the harbor in Charleston.  Story is, she had a sailor boyfriend who said he would return, she met and waved to each ship that came up the river for 44 years, waiting for her boyfriend to return.  Aren’t we men full of lies!

 

Random pictures of some parks in Savannah. 

   

Church in Savannah.

Tiles on the sidewalk in Savannah, notice the one for Forrest Gump.

The bridge in Charleston, a smaller one of the same style is in Savannah. 

On our buggy ride in Charleston.

Sweetgrass baskets on display. 

Tour to Fort Sumter on the passenger ferry.  The is where the Civil War started.  South Carolina was the first state to succeed from the Union, right after Lincoln was elected. 

At Magnolia Gardens, we were a bit late to see all the flowers in bloom.

 

 

Some of the building and architecture in Savannah and Charleston.   

Notice the colors of the houses along rainbow row in Savannah. 

 

Rainbow row in Charleston.  One of the colors was called “H’aint Blue” because it ain’t blue and it ain’t green.  Supposedly, that is a true paint color and you can find it at Lowes.

 

That’s a wrap, more next week.

Thanks   Chuck