GEORGIA – Augusta & Savannah – Lynn and Corrine's North American Tour

AUGUSTA – PHINIZY SWAMP – Mission: Find an alligator! 😁

Mission accomplished 😎 spotted one alligator today! 🐊

AUGUSTA RIVERWALK – Savannah River separates Augusta on one side, South Carolina on the other

Did a bike ride down the Augusta Canal on a beautiful sunshiny day! ☀️ SO many cute turtles! 🐢🐢🐢

HISTORIC DOWNTOWN AUGUSTA

**Springfield Baptist Church** built in 1801

SPRINGFIELD Community of Augusta Georgia in 1872

**Springfield Village Park** is directly across the street and was built in 2002 dedicated to the history of Augusta’s Springfield Community

Tower of Aspiration Fountain – The fountain symbolizes the conversion of the first African to Christianity and the part **Springfield Baptist Church** played in the early conversion of African Americans to Christianity

A SAVIOUR IS BORN – We went to this fantastic walk-through re-creation of the story of Jesus’s birth in Bethlehem. A lot of work and effort went into this! So many volunteers all in costume and live animals! … even camels! It was the coolest experience!

**Jesus is the reason we celebrate this season!**

Matthew 1:21 ***And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins.***

Luke 2:8-14 And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

SAVANNAH – Skidaway State Park – Just after setting up in our campsite at this Park, and just as the sun was going down, we went out for a investigative bike ride and discovered miles trails … a little rough riding in some areas 😳 🫨 It kind of felt like we had biked right out of Savannah and into another land altogether! And the massive oak trees with this eerie-looking Spanish moss hanging on everything was quite something to see!

We were thankful the alligators decided to stay in their Gator Holes while we did a little exploring here 🫣 🐊

The trail opened right up and led to this Observation Tower,

where we arrived just in time to see this beautiful sunset from the top of the Tower! So pretty!

SAVANNAH – Downtown – Next day we took booked a ‘Hop-on-Hop-off’ Trolley Tour of Savannah that left from the Visitor Center which is in a huge beautiful old restored Railroad Train station. Savannah is such a pretty city! There are a total of 22 Historic Squares (parks) throughout the city. Really cool narrow cobblestone streets in the Historic Waterfront District. Interesting history of the cotton industry, shipping port, and WWII Monuments along the river.

The high ceilings and tall windows in this building were fabulous!

It was interesting to walk through and imagine what it might have been like to be one in a crowd of people on a busy day inside this old Train Station 100 years ago 😊

Forsyth Park Fountain – One of Savannah’s most photographed sights, erected in 1858

Beautiful ornate architecture and we just couldn’t quit taking pictures of the massive trees!! Some of them had branches that stretched over two lanes of road and a median in between! Amazing!

City Market – This is a pedestrian-only, 4 block stretch of great little gift shops, music, art, etc all beautifully decorated for Christmas

Also fudge, cookie & candy shops, ice cream & gelato shops 😋 Totally enjoyed our time in the City Market!

and then down to Savannahs Historic Riverside District where we had lunch in the old Cotton Exchange building! then wandered on the wharf and down along the famous cobblestone streets, reading history of the Savannah River shipping port etc. Apparently all the rocks used in the streets came from ships coming into port to pick up cotton. They would load the ships with the amount of rocks equal to the weight of the cotton they expected to load up, and once they got into port in Savannah they would unload the rocks and load up the cotton. After a while Savannah started using this growing pile of rocks for roadbuilding.

This is where the cotton was all piled under these ramps ready for business with the shipping companies when they arrived in port

WWII memorial known as *‘The Cracked Earth Monument’* representing the conflict of a world divided.

SAVANNAH – Fort Pulaski – located on Cockspur Island – This brick fortification was built between 1829 and 1847 to block upriver access to the city. Brick fortifications were rendered obsolete as they did not stand up to rifled cannon combat during the American Civil War in 1862. The Fort is now preserved as a National Monument.

As we walked through we kept seeing this very interesting looking concrete with a lot of oyster shell mixed in it. We learned that this is a hand-made material called Tabby. Tabby is made by melting crushed oyster shells to create lime, then it’s mixed with sand, water and more broken shells to create a kind of concrete unique to the coastal Georgia area in the 1800’s. We first noticed this tabby material here, but have since seen it in many other places we’ve been – so unique and very pretty!