Skip to main content

Really Catching Up!: 2011 Honeymoon Trip: Savannah

When I was last doing these catching up posts it was January 2013 - the last few days and weeks before our oldest son was born.  Hard to believe he is now five, and the many adventures he has taken us on!  Then we had a second one, and he's quickly becoming two.  So I was actually surprised that when I was starting to move some of the old gribblenation Georgia features over to the blog, I realized that I never did a post about Maggie and I's time in Savannah as we closed out our honeymoon in October 2011.
Maggie outside of The Ballastone Inn

After four fun, yet exhausting days at Disney, Maggie and I started our return journey back to Raleigh but with a two day stopover in Savannah.  We stayed at The Ballastone Inn, a historic bed and breakfast within the city's downtown.  The Inn dates back to 1838 and had a colorful history in the 150 years prior to it being converted to a Bed & Breakfast in the 1980s.  We had a pretty casual first night in Savannah - opting to watch football at an Irish pub within walking distance from the Inn.

Line outside of The Lady & Sons to place a reservation.
The next morning, we walked a handful of blocks to Paula Deen's Lady & Sons restaurant.  Now, keep in mind this was before she got in trouble with the Food Network.  Anyways, at this time her restaurant was very popular and tourists, like ourselves, would line up every morning to make their reservations for lunch or dinner.  The photos are from when we arrived to the line at 9:15.  I think they started to take the day's reservations at 9:30


The line wasn't too bad, compared to what we were told lines are in the summer months.  Since then, reservations are now accepted online and up to one year in advance.  We were able to get a 12:45 reservation and returned at that time for lunch.  The Lady & Sons specializes in Southern Comfort Food and offers menu items and a buffet.  We both had the buffet and it is reasonably priced - lunch buffet is $16 today - so mostly like a little less seven years ago.  The food was good, not memorable, and looking back we'd probably have ordered off of the menu.
Maggie enjoying her very southern comfort food lunch at The Lady & Sons

Following lunch and massages at a local spa, we took a carriage tour of Savannah on our way to our dinner destination, Alligator Soul.  Our tour covered many of the sites and squares within Savannah.



Cathedral of St. John the Baptist
Dinner at Alligator Soul was excellent.  Alligator Soul is known for some of its more exotic meats including - elk, kangaroo, ostrich, among others.  Maggie and I didn't go rather exotic as she had a filet and I went with duck.
Entrance to Alligator Soul

As a whole, we were too exhausted to really enjoy and experience Savannah.  We had been to Charleston, St. Augustine, and Walt Disney World over 9 days and were worn out by the time we got to Savannah.  That is not to say we enjoyed our time there as we did immensely.  More that we would like to have toured, seen and experienced more but just were too tired to do so.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Interstate 40's Tumultuous Ride Through the Pigeon River Gorge

In the nearly 60 years Interstate 40 has been open to traffic through the Pigeon River Gorge in the mountains of Western North Carolina, it has been troubled by frequent rockslides and damaging flooding, which has seen the over 30-mile stretch through North Carolina and Tennessee closed for months at a time. Most recently, excessive rainfall from Hurricane Helene in September 2024 saw sections of Interstate 40 wash away into a raging Pigeon River. While the physical troubles of Interstate 40 are well known, how I-40 came to be through the area is a tale of its own. Interstate 40 West through Haywood County near mile marker 10. I-40's route through the Pigeon River Gorge dates to local political squabbles in the 1940s and a state highway law written in 1921. A small note appeared in the July 28, 1945, Asheville Times. It read that the North Carolina State Highway Commission had authorized a feasibility study of a "...water-level road down [the] Pigeon River to the Tennessee l

Ghost Town Tuesday; Mannfield, FL and the stairway to Hell

Back in 2015 I went searching the Lecanto Sand Hills for the original Citrus County Seat known as Mannfield.  Unlike Centrailia in Hernando County and Fivay in Pasco County I did find something worth seeing. Mannfield is located in the Lecanto Sand Hill section of Withlacoochee State Forest somewhat east of the intersection of Citrus County Route 491 and Mansfield Road. Mannfield was named after Austin Mann and founded in Hernando County in 1884 before Citrus County Split away.  In 1887 Citrus County was split from northern Hernando County while Pasco County was spun off to the south.  Mannfield was selected as the new Citrus County seat due to it being near the county geographic center.  Reportedly Mannfield had as many as 250 people when it was the County Seat.  The town included various businesses one might include at the time, even a sawmill which was common for the area.  In 1891 Citrus County voted to move it's seat to Inverness which set the stage for the decline of M

The National Road - Pennsylvania - Great Crossings Bridge and Somerfield

West of Addison, US 40 crosses the Youghiogheny River at what once was the town of Somerfield.  When crossing the current modern two lane bridge, you many not realize that it is actually the third to cross the Yough at this site.  The first - a stone arch bridge - was known as the Great Crossings Bridge.  Built in 1818, this three arch bridge was part of the original National Road.  The name Great Crossings comes from the men who forded the Youghiogheny here - George Washington and George Braddock. (1)  If you cross the bridge at the right time, this historic bridge and what was once the town of Somerfield will appear out from underneath this massive man-made lake. Historical Postcard showing the 'Big Crossings' bridge and Somerfield.  Image submitted by Vince Ferrari. The Great Crossings Bridge was located in the town of Somerfield.  Somerfield, originally named Smythfield until 1827, would develop as a result of the National Road. (1)  Somerfield would go through va