From Alabama to Georgia

So finally we make it to Sarah and Brenen's and settle in to an easy few days, southern style. The first weekend there, the weather is unseasonably warm and we all decide that the best way to celebrate this is to go camping in a lovely town in Georgia, called Savannah. So, off we pop on a four hour drive across state borders and time zones to pitch our jumbo American sized tent in a lovely little camp site, tucked round the back, away from the jumbo American sized RVs, each trying to outdo the other with their satellite TV, 3 bedroom town house motor homes, probably with swimming pools in some of them.

Tent pitched, air beds inflated, we seize the evening and head off out for dinner, stopping at a seafood restaurant where one can look over to the alligator enclosure while chowing down. For those of a nervous disposition, there was also, obscurely, a bunny enclosure, separated by the grinning gators by chicken wire. Should anyone find themselves at the crab shack, tell me how many bunnies you count.

Fully fed we return to the camp site, looking forward to toasting our marshmallows over the camp fire and telling ghost stories through the night. However, on our return, we find a mystery story all of our own. What has happened to the bag of marshmallows we left on the picnic table? After little or no investigation, we decide a fat kid from one of the RVs obviously strolled passed and made light work of them but it would be a few hours later, when day broke and we found the cool box lying open on its side and a trail of food and wrappers leading into the hedges that we would discover the truth about the natural dining habits of raccoons.

The following day, we spent, in the town of Savannah itself. Savannah, is an enchanting town of yesteryear southern states America. It struck me at first that, oddly, it seemed in some ways, similar to a little Cornish village, the explanation would be in the stones used to cobble the roads and build the houses, coming straight from Plymouth as ballast in the bottom of the ships as they brought supplies to the colonies. This contemplation was quickly discarded on discovery of a sweet shop that made its own sweets on the premises and better yet, provided so many free samples that one didn't need to buy anything from it. Perhaps, the most most important note about Savannah though, is that it contains the church of the minister who wrote Jingle Bells. After discovering this fact, I must confess I tuned out somewhat from the rest of the open bus tour. What more is worth knowing about a town? Oh, I did discover one other fact, it is the home of the world's most monotonous tour guide. And, incidentally, it is also the home of Forest Gump, being the town where that and also 'midnight in the garden of good and evil' were filmed.