Georgia

We visited with Deb in her compact apartment in Savannah and in her beach house in Tybee Island.   Her apartment is clean with a loft bed that she constructed herself.  She has made both places into neat, livable spaces.  Avalon at 1009 2nd Avenue is just perfect for your trip to the beach.  I marvelled at her workmanship in the kitchen at the beach house - a brilliant new bamboo floor.  You can view her handiwork at BeachSummerRentals. 

On the 24th she guided us through the raindrops to tour some of the exciting sights including the recently opened Sorrel-Weed House which was featured on "If Walls Could Talk".   It is purported to be the most haunted house in Savannah and is still being excavated and reconstructed.  The Telfair's modern structure featured the wonderful oil and acrylic portraiture of Anthony Palliser and "Myth, Object and the Animal: William Morris Glass".  We saw these fascinating highly textured glass objects earlier at the Mint Museum in Charlotte, NC.  Yes, they are glass but you wouldn't know it.  Also got to visit the newly opened Savannah Bee Honey House (104 W. Broughton St.).  I'd been looking for small bottles of honey to sweeten my coffee and this was gourmet honey which I could sample before buying.  Get these flavors, acacia, black sage and sourwood.  We had dinner at Cha Bella (102 E. Broad St) during the teeming rain that evening.  They feature the freshest local organic produce.  I had the seared black grouper on a bed of  crab/pea/corn succotash, excellent.  When we arrived that night in Tybee Island the streets were swollen with rainwater which we barged through.  On getting out of the vehicle we splashed through the deep puddles and got our shoes full of water.

Saturday the rains cleared away and we enjoyed a walk on the beach in the morning.  We lunched at Firefly Cafe (321 Habersham St.) where I had a nice Greek salad.  The wag-o-weeners arrived to get their treats while we enjoyed the passing scene on the sidewalk.  The sunset over the back bay below speaks for itself.

Savannah	Oct. 24th, 2008	Sorrel-Weed House (6 W. Harris St.)	interior detail	Deb now works at Savannah's most haunted house.	Telfair Museum of Art			Deb and Linda
		The old Telfair across the green	Deb helped in the remodelling An American Craftsman Gallery		Cathedral of St. John the Baptist	Wag-o-ween for the dogs.	Gaslight
Tybee Island	Oct. 25th	The rains drained away and	I guess it was warm enough for swimming.		Did I capture a sunset?			Perhaps the most gorgeous one I've seen.

I've visited the state of Georgia a number of times now since my daughter moved there.  At first she lived in Atlanta and now she seems to have taken root in Tybee Island, a few miles from Savannah.  It is a lovely resort town which is just a few feet above sea level.  Just before Christmas 2003 I dropped in on her and husband Jay and had a surprisingly good time.

There was the warmth of the hearth, meeting new people and some old friends, a Christmas tree trimmed with Chinese paper ornaments from a recent trip to Hawaii and delightful meals prepared by Deb.  Visiting were Jason and Deb's friends from Florida, Angie and Jason, and Jason's dad, PK, Matt who lives in Jamaica and of course me, Deb's dad.  Deb and Angie spent the 22nd making mango chutney, biscotti and pasta for the evening's meal, all from scratch!  They displayed an amazing amount of energy.  That night Jason's dad arrived with the oysters from the eastern shore of Maryland, the best he declared.  They were indeed.  Deb's Italian meal was superb and was followed by songs by Angie on guitar, Jay on mandolin and harmonica and Matt on bongo drums.  Angie has a marvelous voice and Jay rises to the occasion with fitting riffs on the mandolin.  They did Bonny Rait's Sugar Momma and Ben Harper's Another Lonely Day with memorable passion.  I had no idea they were so talented.  Thanks guys for Christmas 2003.