Way up the Suwannee River

This week was to have been a discovery of Georgia’s coastal islands, but alas fate turned us in another direction. We did get down to a lovely State Park on the Coast near King Bay Submarine Base where the Trident Missile Submarines are based. Whilst setting up the Fifth Wheel we noticed that the bedroom slideout wasn’t level and was tearing the seals protecting the inside against water. We tried adjusting it but to no avail, so we decided to take it to a service centre in Jacksonville, Florida in a couple of days time, which left one day for exploring.

So we decided to go gator hunting in the Okefenokee Swamp. The swamp is the largest freshwater swamp in North America and the source of the Suwannee River so beloved in the song by Stephen Foster – Way down the Swannee River. Except that he spelt it wrong because it wouldn’t parse properly.

We drove up to the Okefenokee National Park and went on a boat cruise through the swamp.

A bleak and uninviting place but filled with life especially alligators and turtles. We saw lots of them lying still in the water keeping cool in the very hot sun. One alligator had just hatched 18 youngsters and she was caring for them as we stopped to say hello.

Nest day we drove to Jacksonville and met with the RV dealer who was going to fix the problem. He diagnosed a broken bed roller which was quite complicated to fix, so we went off to the local mall in the air conditioning for the day and when we returned all was done. Then we headed south further into Florida and stopped near the oldest town in the US called St Augustine.  Founded in the mid 1500s by the Spanish. It has a lovely very old fort looking out over the Intracoastal Waterway.

It also boasts the oldest school house in America.

And several lovely museums converted from turn of the century hotels built by a railway tycoon called Flagler.

St Augustine has a lovely old historic district, heavily restored but still with some charm, though the town itself is very touristy. It was Federal Lands Day on the day we visited and we had free admission to the fort.

Then today we headed further south to Silver Springs near Ocala where we will be until the end of the week. This is central North Florida – Horse Country as it is called.

I thought on this second last blog of this year that it would be good to record some observations on Americans as we have seen them over the last few months. We have been amazed at how patriotic most are. Very respectful of their flag and very respectful and grateful to the men and women in their armed services. In NZ and other British and European countries we treat servicemen and women as just another career with no special respect.

We have also noticed our there is a huge section of the populace that are very conservative. There is a right way and a wrong way and nothing in between. Some politicians pander to this offering simplistic solutions for very complex problems. Lots of churches have sprung up as well with all kinds of weird names. Religion is big business in the US and even the smallest of towns has so many churches that it is amazing. Most seem to be small independent churches where the pastor has decided to form his/her own church as a career option. In the local bookshop there was one aisle for travel books and three aisles for Bible Books.

Consequently there is a lot of polarisation between conservatives and liberals and the government is in paralysis at present. The system of checks and balances that has stood America well in the past is facing its greatest challenge. Compromise is a dirty word. The favourite expression is ‘My Way or the Highway’. 

Southern Charm

We left Chapel Hill bright and early on Monday and picked up the fifth wheel that had been serviced, and headed south on that great highway linking the North of the US to the South - the I-95. We were heading for Charleston in South Carolina, some 300 miles away. Whilst not the Capitol of SC it is certainly the best known city in the state.

Next day we drove to one of the great plantations that created the wealth that the south rose to prosperity on. It was called Boone Plantation and the entrance was through a magnificent drive lined with Live Oaks (so called because they are evergreen) and draped with that uniquely southern plant - Spanish Moss (an epiphyte).




We visited the slave cabins and heard a lively talk from an African American on the Gullah language that developed after the War between the States ( as the south calls the civil war, or the war of northern aggression). It is a type of pigeon English. We also visited the lovely plantation house.




The weather was superb all week. Hot but not too hot and sunny. We also did a coach tour of the estate and saw the various crops that they still produce.

Next day we drove into Charleston and admired he lovely antebellum houses (houses built before the civil war) especially on the river in an area called the Battery.




Charleston grew wealthy on the backs of cotton and rice using the slaves for labour. After the war it fell into a long slumber and has only recently woken up. Later that day we went on a cruise around Charleston Harbour and out onto the Intracoastal Waterway which runs down the entire length of the eastern USA inside numerous barrier islands. We saw lots of dolphins and they rode our bow wave for a long time. We passed the USS Yorktown, a WWII carrier that has taken up residence in Charleston.




On Thursday we drove down the coast to a town called Beaufort, also on the Intracoastal Waterway. It was very beautiful with lots of antebellum houses.




It is quite small and very manageable to visit with not many tourists. It is surrounded as are all the southern coastal towns by salt water marshes with rivers and creeks running through them often for many miles inland.




Great fishing and boating with lots of wild life. Alligators abound in the fresh water ponds and creeks. We had a nice lunch there by the waterfront and admired the local inn that has stood there for many centuries.




Yesterday the weather turned cloudy but that brought a welcome coolness down to the mid twenties from the mid thirties. We left Charleston and headed south again for a 100 miles to Savannah in Georgia. We are staying in a lovely Island State Park right on the Intracoastal Waterway just over the bridge over THE Moon River wide than a mile which we crossed in some style. We went to a talk by the park ranger on the local reptiles and saw snakes, turtles and gators from the area. Afterwards we went on one of the many trails around the island underneath Live Oaks and Spanish Moss and the ubiquitous Palmettos that grow everywhere in the South.




Today we visited Savannah. We were a bit disappointed in it as it often run down and whilst there are some lovely squares and parks like the one below, there are also many ugly buildings.




But all the transport was free so we caught a bus with no windows down to River St and a free ferry for a tour along the river and back.




Savannah also declined after the Civil War and only recently like Charleston has it revived its heritage and started to develop its own personality. More lovely antebellum homes completed our visit to this charming southern city.

This week we visit the sea isles off the Georgian coast and head across the border to our last State for this year - Florida.

Ex Hurricane Lee decided to play it tough with the US and after it made landfall in Louisiana it headed north and drenched the whole of the East Coast and especially the Blue Ridge Mountains where we were. We were hoping on Monday to go down south to Asheville, the highlight of the Blue Ridge Mountains. But the prospect of a day's driving in the pouring rain and spending the next couple of days in heavy rain put us off so we decided to stay put and spent the next three days listening to the heavy rain on the roof.

On Thursday the rain eased and we drove across North Carolina to Chapel Hill to have a service done on our fifth wheel and to meet and stay with our friend, Mary who lives in Chapel Hill.

One day we drove down to Pinehurst, in the Sandhills region where the US Golf Open is held each year. A nice area to live in. We had a lovely picnic in the city park.

This week we head in to the real South and will be visiting Charleston and Savannah.

Location:And the Rain came Down

The Blue Ridge Mountains

We had a lovely campsite in the Shenandoah River State Park and on our first day there we decided to visit the Shenandoah Battlefield Trail centred around Front Royal. But it was a bit of a disappointment with really nothing other than plaques marking historical events. So we called it a day and went back to the park.

We were staying near the Blue Ridge Mountains. These are the first major mountains that are reached from the East Coast and were a huge barrier to settlers for over a hundred years. They are a concentric series of ridges stretching out for a hundred miles east to west with the Blue Ridge Mountains the highest and the most Eastern. All along the main ridge for 550 miles runs a road. In the north it is called the Skyline Drive and further south it is called the Blue Ridge Parkway.

We drove up to the Skyline Drive thousands of feet about the Shenandoah Valley on one side, the the Piedmont Plain on the other, and admired the glorious views.

There were lots of places where you could pull over and admire the view. You can see for miles and miles.

There were lots of deer feeding gently at the side of the road and very little traffic – virtually none which was a surprise as 20 million people visit the Skyline Drive and Parkway each year.

We got back and Wendy wanted to go  to the State Park Visitor Centre so she drove up their by herself while I made a cup of tea. When she came back she was all smiling and burst out with “I have just seen 4 black bears”.

She was so thrilled as they are not common to spot during the day at all.

We moved on the next day to 200 yards from the border of Virginia and North Carolina in a town called Galax. It is only a short distance from the Blue Ridge Parkway which slopes gently up from the West to the ridge and then drops precipitously don to the eastern plain. At 5 o'clock that night there was a thunderstorm which did not damage to our campground, but very bad damage just a short distance a way knocking out the power. All the lines men were over by the Virginia Beaches fixing lines there after Hurricane Irene had gone through, so in the end we were without power for 28 hours.

We drove up on to the Blue Ridge Parkway but it was a hazy day as Hurricane Lee in the Gulf of Mexico was already gearing up for an assault up to us. But the views were still stunning and the traffic quiet.

The James River flows right through a cut in the Blue Ridge Mountains and even a long way from the sea, as we, are it is an impressive river. It was canalised all the way up here in the 1800s.

Hurricane Lee is threatening bad weather for us this week and Hurricane Katia is hovering off the coast as well with an unknown track as yet. We continue our way down the Blue Ridge Parkway this week  to its southern most point near Asheville, North Carolina (Hillbilly Country) and explore the Great Smokey Mountains of Tennessee  (Weather permitting).