Savannah GA; Family Visit & St. Patrick’s Day

We are now into our third week stationed just outside of the beautiful city of Savannah, GA.  We decided to return again this year after visiting for one week last year in May.  The timing of our visit in the month of March has been close to perfect.  All of the azaleas and camellias have been bursting in full bloom.  The temperatures have been cooler, we experienced the St. Patrick’s Day celebration in this crazy town, and best of all, we had a visit from family from Texas!

We still consider ourselves to be very blessed to be able to travel this country and see all of God’s wonders.  I get up in the morning and it still seems strange to not have to go to work.  Living in the RV feels like being at home and on vacation at the same time.  Difficult to describe.

In a prior post, I described how the Historic District of Savannah was laid out in a perfect grid pattern that includes 22 town squares.  This grid is about 2 miles by 1 mile and the brick and cobblestone streets are all very walkable.  There are restaurants, bars, homes to tour, and many shops all well integrated within the two square miles.

We were very fortunate to have a visit from Pat’s brother Mike and his wife Lorna, from Dallas Texas.  During their five days here, we walked about 20 miles (including one 6+ miler), toured three stately historic mansions, a maritime museum, a lighthouse, the famous Bonaventure cemetery, and the popular River Street and the City Market.

It was five fun days filled from morning to late into the evening.  We had some great food at many fine establishments and hosted our family out to the RV park one evening.  The city of Savannah at this time of year is way more beautiful than photos can really capture.  One lady at church said it must be what heaven would look like with a myriad of flowers bloomed out on every street.

The St. Patrick’s Day party begins a week before the 17th as more and more people are filling the town.  The green costumes and green beer were flowing all week.  Here are a collection of some of the photo highlights from the week.

The Davenport House was almost demolished in 1955 to make room for a parking lot.  Can you imagine?  Good thing that a group of ladies got together to save it.  I really enjoy seeing these fine old mansions from the 1800’s that have been well preserved.  Savannah and Charleston SC are the two towns that have some of the best examples of this.

Interesting story from our tour guide as we toured this cemetery below.  General Sherman (Union) destroyed and burned down all of the southern towns until he got to Savannah.  There are many stories as to why he spared Savannah.  Look them up.  The new story that we learned from the tour was that Sherman quartered his horses and some men in this cemetery.

To make room, they removed most of the simple headstones.  He also ordered his troops to remove all of the caskets and bones from the crypts (like the crypt below), to be burned to keep themselves warm during the winter.  The crypts are all empty now.  Kind of morbid.

The soldiers also amused themselves by modifying the grave stone’s engraving to add some humorous twist.

If you look closely at the face of this family crypt, you will notice a half round of bricks at the bottom center.  To add another person to the crypt, they would knock out these bricks and remove the dirt below to reveal a set of stairs descending into the crypt.

In my next post, we will conclude our family visit with some more museums, home tours and a dinner at the finest restaurant in Savannah.

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