Cape to Milan

Sometimes Alex and I are so intent on the next passport stamp that we forget to set aside time to explore neighboring gems. So when Alex suggested we visit pretty little Savannah, I couldn’t resist. I hadn’t seen the city since a 5th grade field trip, when my primary interest was a thorough investigation of each taffy and fudge shop on River Street.  My thrills have changed a bit since then. But once I arrived, the grassy squares and proud colonial homes seemed familiar, and now I could appreciate them a bit more–before finding the closest fudge shop, of course.

But you know us. This could be no typical trip to Savannah. We wanted to keep it as low to the ground as our international travels, so we forsook the car and hopped on the Greyhound. I won’t deny that the trip to Savannah was fairly atrocious–girl gabbing on her cell phone about the most personal of issues behind us while the bus creaked with some mysterious loose part that nearly drove me insane–but the trip back home was positively lovely with a new-ish, spacious, and fairly empty bus. And the bus ride gave us plenty of time to delve into the required reading for any visit to Savannah: Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. After reading that, I was primed to see drag queens running through the streets and public duels between men with drawls.

We didn’t do much in Savannah. No nighttime ghost tours in horse-drawn carriages for us. But we did a ton of walking, and around each corner in Savannah there is something beautiful, intriguing, or mysterious.

I loved this ivy covered home, which is for sale for any interested buyers. (I’ll covet it forever, though.)

Thanks to SCAD, art galleries are tucked into nooks and crannies all around the city. We stopped at this printmaking exhibit, manned (or womanned, I guess) by a gregarious security guard who shared her interpretations of the art with us.

And we must not forget the grave of Edward Greene Malbone, acclaimed miniaturist. Cemeteries are different in Savannah. They’re essentially parks with lots of artfully worded mini-biographies.

(Still no drag queens, though.)

We visited St. John the Baptist church, still decked in red and green.

We spent the requisite time on River Street, watching for boats and tourists.

Perhaps the best treat of the trip was finding this South African take-away restaurant.

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This curried chicken over mashed potatoes tasted straight out of Cape Town.

And on the walk back we finally caught a glimpse of that famous Savannah style so clearly depicted in Midnight. Alcohol is as commonplace as shoes.

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