In this episode, we drive a lot, pass through towns I didn't remember, survive an artillery barrage, search for lighthouses and eat real good South Carolina BBQ.
We spent most of yesterday driving through Georgia. We took the secondary roads to the coast going from Lake Seminole to Bainbridge then following US 84 through Thomasville, Valdosta, Waycross, Jessup and Hinesville, then back roads to Fort McAllister State Historical Park for the night.
It was lunchtime as we passed through Homerville and we were looking for a place to pull in and have lunch in Speedy. Homerville has a strange highway configuration. US 84 splits into a divided highway through town, with homes and businesses in the median. As we passed by a rather dreary set of brick buildings in the median strip with a parking lot, Ellen said "We've had lunch there before". My reply was, "Of course not, I haven't been here before". Shortly, we found a parking lot across from the historic Homerville train station and had lunch.
Ellen was sure we'd been through this town in the past. I couldn't remember when. It was time to consult the Speedy Journal. Sure enough, she was right. We'd come the other way just last year using the same route as a shortcut on the way to Texas. We hadn't gone as far as Bainbridge, but dropped down to I-10 earlier to get to Lake Seminole. We had stopped in the dreary parking lot and had lunch in Homerville. How Ellen could recognize and remember that location while traveling in the other direction on a different road is beyond me. I couldn't even remember that we'd taken any of this route.
We didn't leave the deja vu-like experiences alone. When we reached Waycross we missed a turn in an area where there are lots of numbered roads merging and splitting (Jill, our GPS voice, didn't even peep about the turn until we missed it ("Off route, Recalculate?"). I think there were six numbered routes sharing the same stretch of road. We got to next confusing intersection and turned into the Kroger supermarket there to figure out how to get back on track.
At that point, we remembered that the same thing happened last year going the other way through Waycross and we ended up in the same parking lot. Fortunately, that Kroger also houses a Starbucks, so I could get a latte to straighten my brain a bit and get us back on track (it took a Vente).
The rest of the drive was pretty uneventful and we got to Fort McAllister with plenty of daylight and there were plenty of sites available. It may have been a Friday night, but it was still quite gray, damp and cold, so the campground was not sold out.
We first picked a site with a view of the marsh, but we couldn't get Speedy leveled. We were too lazy to get out the boards and level the van for an overnight stop. When Ellen started dinner, however, we realized that it was just a bit too far out of level to cook comfortably...the stove is not gimbaled.
There was another empty site right across from us. It was level, so Ellen turned off the stove, I unplugged Speedy and we shifted to the other level site. We continued heating up our fabulous dinner of canned chili...the larder is getting a little bare. Our dismay at being reduced to chili with cheese and crackers (but it was really good cheddar) was furthered by the receipt of an email from our friends wintering in the Bahamas. They sent a photo of all of them returning from a fishing trip with each holding a large Mahi-mahi—fresh fish for dinner—in shorts, too—did I mention that it was in the 40s here?
After we arrived at the park, while we were having dinner and well into the night, we kept hearing loud booms. The only thing we could think of is that they were coming from Fort Stewart, but the nearest edge of the fort was about 10 miles away. I took a look online and found that there are three artillery battalions there as part of the 3rd Infantry Division. By looking for recent news, I found that they had just started a three week training exercise with new cannons. Evidently, the battalions hadn't had a live-fire exercise in over a year, had just received new weapons and were making the most of it. They must be very loud up close if we could hear them 10 miles or more away.
This morning, after another night under the winter side of our Travasak (and random booms throughout the night), we decided to move on. There are five lighthouses between Fort McAllister and Buck Hall. We have been slowly collecting East Coast lighthouse passport stamps for our friends Garry and Kate out west, so we decided we'd make it a slow trip up to Charleston.
First stop Tybee Island, two lighthouses here, Tybee Island Light (still in use) and Cockspur Island Light at Fort Pulaski National Monument (no longer lit). It was a pleasant, if long, drive out to the end of Tybee Island. The light and museum were open and I got the stamp. (We didn't pay the $7/each to climb the 175 feet up the lighthouse).
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| Tybee Island Light |
It was then off to Fort Pulaski, another pre-Civil War era masonry fort. We saw the lighthouse crossing the bridge off of Tybee Island. It is on the water, so it can't be easily visited, but the stamp is in the Fort's Visitor Center.
We got the stamp and toured the fort. We also got to see more artillery. They were demonstrating the firing of two civil war cannon. They, too, were quite loud. One was a small smooth bore cannon and the other was a larger rifled cannon of the type first used on Fort Pulaski. When I say "used on", I mean that they were used to attack the fort. It was seized by the Georgia militia at the start of the Civil War. Needless to say, the Union wanted it back. They brought over these new-fangled rifled cannon that had never been used before and mounted them on Tybee Island. After 30 hours of bombardment, the Union forces had breached the walls of the supposedly impregnable fort and the Confererates surrendered the fort. The era of the masonry fort was over and virtually all the coastal defenses of the south (and most of the US) were obsolete.
After Tybee, our next intended stop was South Carolina and Harbor Town Lighthouse on Hilton Head. We drove into and out of Savannah, across the river and up US 17 to SC 315 and into Hardeeville. As we drive up 315, we passed the Pink Pig.
Just last night we were discussing South Carolina BBQ—discussing how we would find some of the good places. I looked up the South Carolina Barbeque Association. They judge barbeque competitions in South Carolina. They might know good barbeque. In fact, they do and have published the list of the Top 100 Barbeque Houses in South Carolina. I remembered that the Pink Pig was on the list. A quick turn around and we stopped for lunch.
We both had the pork sandwich and split a rib sampler (six ribs). With fries, it was under $20 and lived up to its rating. They have a selection of four sauces, the Lowcountry Fire was the best, a spicy tomato-based, but not too hot, sauce. The others, Honey Mustard, Gullah Spice (also a mustard sauce) and Sweet Vermont Style (not actually from Vermont) were also pretty good.
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| Food Porn |
We continued on. While stopped in traffic in Buffton, we noticed the Corner Perk across the street. There was a parking space next to us and we took it. Time for coffee.
The door hardware was promising and the roaster inside even more so.
The coffee lived up to the promise. This is a cafe in the Italian style and even has a bar as well as coffee. I had a bit of a wait for my latte as the bartender, also barista, mixed someone a rather fruity drink before she got to my coffee.
Onward to Hilton Head and the lighthouse—or so we thought. We'd driven about 50 miles, including a section of toll road on Hilton Head Island, by the time we reached the entrance to Sea Pines. It turns out that Harbor Town Lighthouse is on the Sea Pines Resort, the original Hilton Head development. It is, in fact, part of Sea Pines, built as a private aid to navigation (or maybe tourist attraction?).
There is a gate at Sea Pines and you can't just go on the resort. Visitors have to pay for the privilege, $6 per car—and they mean car. We figured that we'd come this far, so we'd pony up the entry fee. Even this was dashed. The guard took one look at Speedy and deemed that we were not acceptable. Speedy has tanks. Therefore, it is an RV. RVs are not allowed on Sea Pines. Aha, we thought—we have bicycles. NO—bicycles aren't allowed either. The only way we could enter Sea Pines to see the lighthouse was to take a cab. That wasn't about to happen—certainly not for a non-historic private lighthouse. Defeated, we turned around and drove back down the toll road and off Hilton Head.
At first we decided that we'd skip Hunting Island Lighthouse, another 40 mile detour, and just go to Fort Moultrie and Sullivan's Island Lighthouse near Charleston, then try to get a site at Buck Hall (our reservation isn't until tomorrow night). As we drove along we realized that we'd never get to the Fort Moultrie visitor center in time, so we decided to go to Hunting Island after all. The lighthouse is at the state park and the state park has a campground. Maybe they'd have some room.
Even though it looked like they were full for the weekend when I checked a couple of days ago, they had nine sites available. All those available would fit nothing bigger than Speedy, but we have Speedy. We found a site, drove up to the park visitor center, got the stamp, saw lighthouse, set up in our site (a small pull-through), had tuna noodle casserole (stove-top style) for dinner, walked up to the camp store and got Häagen-Dazs bars for dessert and wrote it all down in the Speedy Journal.
Tomorrow it is on to Charleston and Buck Hall.
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