Kingsport to Savannah GA

Sunday February 28, 2010

We drove away from home with the temperature a cold blustery 31 degrees at 8:45 AM. This was probably the poorest job of planning Jane has done on a trip for years…we had made our reservations over 9 months ago as that is the ONLY way to get reservations at Long Key State Park in the Florida Keys. About 6 weeks ago we canceled the other reservations we had made for a week-long trip down and a week-long return trip. We reserved one night out coming and going at Jonathan Dickinson State Park in Stuart FL and then got “free for points” reservations at a La Quinta in Savannah for the other nights of the trip down and back.

We were also going to make a stop in Durham on the trip down to visit the Harris’- deliver a bike, some Dr. Enuf and enjoy visiting Jeff, Robin and grandson Dan. Well this past week we deleted the stop in Durham due to Jane’s mother being in the hospital most of the week. We got her settled at her assisted living on Friday and although still recovering from bronchitis we left today so as not to lose our reservations for the week in the keys. Many thanks will go to all the great staff at Wellington and brother Jim for watching over things for the next few days.

We basically stuffed everything in the Sprinter as it was too cold to pack much…we will sort it all out tomorrow evening when we camp in Stuart. Little research was done on anything other than making the reservations – but off we went very anxious to get out of the cold weather. Our winter in TN has been unusually cold and snowy this year to say the least and we are hoping when we return in 13 days it will be SPRING !!!

There was no snow in Kingsport but as we reached Erwin and began the climb to Sam’s Gap there was hoarfrost on the trees – as we drove on there were huge icicles on the cuts in the mountains. There was light snow on the road near Sam's Gap and down the NC side of the mountain. Very gray and looked like it could snow at any minute. All along the highway were broken trees from all the heavy snow over the past 3 months. We were through Asheville in short order and stopped near Hendersonville for some more coffee. It was not until we started down Saluda mountain that the sun began to peak through the clouds.

The drive was uneventful as we continued on I 26 through Spartanburg and on to Columbia – we stopped for a quick hamburger somewhere along the way. The sun is warm through the windshield but it is still cool outside. When we turned south on I 95 it began to warm a little more.



The traffic south on I 95 was heavy but not so much going north - can't say I would want to go north either! When we arrived in Savannah it was in the mid 40’s and the wind had stopped blowing. The sunshine did make a difference in ATTITUDE. We are listening to a book-on-CD that we are both sure we have heard before but neither of us can remember much about it… not sure what that says about the book or about us! Jane was also interested in seeing how the phone service with new i-phone and ATT would be – we were never without phone service and internet was probably available half the time.



The GPS easily found our La Quinta – we arrived about 4:30. Jane began researching all the recommendations for seafood restaurants from her FaceBook friends. We found we were quite a distance (about 10 miles) from downtown Savannah and since we were both exhausted – Jane from being up so many nights this past week at the hospital and Ben from driving all day – that we just settled for a close-by seafood restaurant. We will drive into Savannah when we return in a little over a week. I read the recommendations for the Shell House which was less than a mile from us – some great comments and a few bad ones…but we went anyway and it was very good. The hush puppies were maybe the best ever and the oysters and catfish very good. It was nothing fancy but good seafood, excellent quick service, and it suited us tonight. Crab legs must have been a house special as I could not believe how many were being eaten – one lady at a table near us ate 2 buckets by herself!

Time for this blog entry, reading a little and a good nights sleep are going to help this blogger for sure! To illustrate how tired I am – I am not going out to the Sprinter to get my camera doc for downloading photos…that is just going to have to wait until tomorrow!