– Savannah Smiles –
This time of year, as school is getting into heavier workloads, the Snow Birds are returning, traffic is increasing, restaurants are filling up and life starts to feel kind of cluttered in general.
Sometimes it makes me feel like I can’t breath.
A quick long weekend getaway to refresh my creative mind was exactly what I needed. Savannah is about a 7 hour drive from Jupiter, Florida.
If you get an early start it’s not that terrible, especially if you share the drive with 3 other fun, fearless females that make the time fly by.
We were blessed to have relatives of the group that live on Wilmington Island, a tiny gem of an island where you will find celebrities homes hidden away, including, yes, “Butter Ya’ll, Paula Deen’s home.
That first night we were treated to a wonderfully home cooked turkey dinner, and a bonfire on the water with a thick slice of homemade pecan pie. Talk about Southern Hospitality!
After a lovely breakfast that included homemade biscuits and fresh coffee overlooking the water we headed off into the Historical District of Savannah for a Slow Ride Bike Tour.
What a great way to see the city!
Nothing like a little exercise to make you feel good about that Snake Bite that you drink at McDonough’s Irish Pub.
Our Tour director, Ed, gave us a nice overview of the history of the city while we enjoyed the beautiful day biking about the squares. I’m going to insert some honesty here…..it’s not as easy as it looks to pedal those things around. So remember to give props to anyone you see attempting it, nice big waves and smiles to cheer them on would be nice. (grouchy Trolley driver I still remember your mean face).
Lunch at Paula Deen’s restaurant, Lady and Son’s with butter crocks and candles of Gooey Cake to take home.
And some shopping around the quaint little stores filled our afternoon.
We closed out the day at Rocks on the Roof along the Bay Street waterway while watching a freighter come in and barely fit under the Savannah Bridge.
Saturday we woke up and packed a yummy lunch of leftover ham and turkey sandwiches, sliced fruit and veggies and a bottle of Prosecco and headed off to Forsyth Park where we spent a lazy afternoon picnicking.
Topping off our picnic was an adorable little Chocolate Shop, Chocolat by Adam Turoni, inspired by Alice in Wonderland and a Library. Such a unique place, where you take little trays and open the cabinet doors to personally select your favorite chocolate combinations before taking them to the front to check out. At the back of the shop you can watch them making the chocolate masterpieces by hand.
Amazing stuff and totally worth the stop if you are in Savannah. They have been featured in Southern Cooking and Cooking with Paula Deen, as well as on the Travel Channel. I tried the Modern Pumpkin Pie, Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup (my personal favorite), and a Kahlua Dark Chocolate yumminess.
We found a nice little art festival where we enjoyed browsing.
Found a couple things that really inspired me and I will be incorporating into my next couple of pieces….yes, I was finding my creative mind again!
This was exactly what I needed.
We get so caught up in the day to day monotony of living that if we don’t step away and refill our creative minds we start to wither up and die.
One of my favorite little shops that we visited was the Savannah Bee Company. They actually have 4 locations in Georgia, and we stopped into 2 of them. At the Broughton Street location we had a delicious Mead Tasting. Mead is the oldest fermented beverage and it’s key ingredient is Honey. Several sips of mead, samples of honey butters and slathers of thick, rich hand creams later we walked out with lots of bags full of amazing products to take home with us.
Next stop, The Salt Table where we sampled all kinds of salt from Ghost Pepper hotness, to smokey Bacon Salt. I bought a little salt grater and a large lump of himalayan pink salt, and a couple of bottles of Local Hot Sauce, including “Smack Yo Granny” sauce that my youngest son found hilarious. We went with a lighter “walking dinner” of a yummy martini from Jen’s and Friends, and a savory pie from the Pie Society, a Traditional British Bakery. I highly recommend the Spinach, Mushroom and Feta.
We packed some yummy leftover ham sandwiches for the drive home the next morning.
This break was a fresh breeze blowing the cobwebs out of my mind….
Kisses,
Ro