Southern Trip: Savannah

Although we were sad to leave Charleston, it was exciting to discover another city after a short 2 hour drive.

Our first stop in Savannah was River Street- which, you guessed it- borders the Savannah River.

Savannah is well known for its 'squares.' The city was planned out in a grid pattern around these small parks. There are 22, and we managed to see 8 of them. All of the ones we saw were surrounded by historic buildings and full of pretty trees and flowers.

Johnson Square was the very first one created- it's near the gold-domed City Hall.

Oglethorpe and Chippewa Squares are near the Colonial Park Cemetery- home to- what do you know- graves dating back to the colonial period.

Lafayette Square is next to the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. We popped into the church and managed to catch a tour. One fun fact for you fellow non-Catholics: a red candle near the altar stays lit at all times to remind people of the presence of what they believe to be the literal body and blood of Christ (in the form of bread and wine).

Telfair and Wright Square were full of flowers.

My favorites were Madison and Monterey Squares. 

I thought this was a church off of Monterey Square (middle picture below), but it's actually a synagogue from in the 1700s. We learned that South Carolina and Georgia allowed all types of European immigrants besides Catholics, which resulted in both places becoming home to some of the oldest Jewish communities in the U.S. 

The Catholic thing was political- the Catholic Spanish and French were nearby in Florida and Louisiana, and the English were not big fans. 

Forsyth Park is just past Monterey Square. This is not just a little square, but a large park. 

We would have explored more but the heat (not used to 80 degrees after a Wisconsin winter) and hanger (we hadn't eaten breakfast) started to set in. It was perfect timing for what David called "the best meal of his life."

So we proceeded to wait in line for an hour at Mrs. Wilkes' Dining Room. According to the reviews online the wait was worth it, and we're glad we stuck it out. This is a southern-style restaurant that serves the kind of food that would clog your arteries if you had it all the time.

The line.

The  view from our table.

We ordered one meal to split- allow me to describe the insane amount of food we got for $20. The main course was fried chicken. They gave us at least 15 big pieces of chicken. That whole greasy bag was full of chicken. I'm pretty sure more than one chicken died to provide this meal lol.

Lunch came with 3 sides. We chose mashed potatoes, corn, and mac and cheese. Then for free they gave us candied yams, rice, okra, peas, banana pudding, cornbread, biscuits, and pound cake. Really. Everything we tried was delicious.

Please note the very satisfied expression on David's face.

Our last stop in Savannah was Bonaventure Cemetery, which is a bit outside of the city. We didn't spend a very long time here, but even so I ended up with so many pretty pictures. Everywhere I turned looked like a painting.

Next stop: Biltmore Mansion in North Carolina