Tesla Road Trip

April 26,2015

Each day on the road seems to bring new surprises.  I have discovered that the pictures really don't show the real story but they will serve in years to come all the neat places we have gone and the interesting things we have seen.  Also heightened my awareness about what a beautiful country we live in that we all tend to miss unless you hit the road.

Don't think we have done very well at making progress towards home in the last few days.  Sunday we only managed to rack up 155 miles going from Savannah to Macon, Georgia. Our thought that we could go to Savanna early on a Sunday morning and there would not be any traffic or people about was a pretty silly assumption.  I think half of the country is currently traveling about like we are.

First stop of the day was of course, the Supercharger.  Had to back track eight miles down the highway to the Savanna/Hilton Head Airport. The charger was located in the parking lot and if you went in and got your ticket stamped you did not have to pay for parking.  Okay, we can do that.  Off towards the entrance to the airport.  Surprise!  Most airports are pretty plain jane and blah.   Not Savanna. You would have thought you were walking into a luxury hotel.  Here are a couple of pictures - see what you think.

Entrance to Savannah  Airport.

Then it was off to see the city.

We did not get very far into town before we realized that their was no quiet Sunday morning on a beautiful day.  Luckily we found a parking place with out too much trouble and in a place where we could easily find the car.  Then off on our hike around town.  I wished I had a better camera than my iPhone as it is difficult to really capture the houses and architecture when everything is so close        together and hidden in the trees.     We walked for about two and a half hours up and down the         streets and along the Savannah River.  It seemed every corner we turned brought a new surprise and   something more beautiful.

 

                                                                                                                                                                         When the town was laid out in 1733, there were 22 squares and the houses were built around the squares. Some of the squares are larger than others but all are filled with trees statutes or fountains.  It was the job of the people would lived around each square to landscape their own.  Of course now the city takes care of them, but each one is a little different but beautiful. Savannah is one of the largest National Historic Districts in the country and is much more than you can see even in a week.  Poor Lucky walked his little legs off for two and a half hours but I think he did better than we did.

The city itself has always been an important sea port.    Agriculture was essential to Savannah's economy.  During its first two centuries silk and indigo production were its mainstay shipping as much as a ton of silk per year to England. Georgia's mild climate offered perfect conditions for growing cotton and was the dominant commodity after the American Revolution.  Its production under the plantation system and shipment through the Port of Savannah helped the city's European immigrants achieve wealth and prosperity.Sitting twenty miles up river from the Atlantic Ocean has helped it maintain its importance as a seaport.

The old cotton warehouse along the river have now turned into shops and restaurants, Many of the old commercial buildings have been restored as hotels by Hilton, Weston, and Hampton Inn to name a few.  I think what really impressed me was the reuse of the old structures by companies who tend to always build new.  On our stroll by the river we saw a cargo and a chemical freighter plus all the tour boats.

   Savannah is a beautiful city and one I am very glad I got to see.  Traveling through this part of the country I have realized I need to go back and read some history books.  Oklahoma history was a breeze compared to the three hundred years, the American Revolution and the Civil War that happened here.

                                        This will be my favorite memory of our trip to Savannah.

We left Savannah about 1;00  and headed off towards Macon, Georgia which was the next Supercharger on our trip south.  I think I thought that we would make to maybe halfway to Montgomery, Alabama before stopping for the night.  Surprise - Macon was a surprise we could not miss.  The supercharger was located downtown close to the visitor center.  As we drove in that direction we noticed this huge downtown area of totally renovated buildings.  I don't know what I thought Macon would look like - but this was amazing.

Macon is the largest city (154.000) in the Macon-Warner Robbins area that has a combined population of 400,00 and is 85 miles south of Atlanta.  Macon was establishes at the sire of the Fort Benjamin Hawkins built in 1806.  The fort served as a major distribution point for goods during the War of 1812 with Great Britain.  The city survived due its ability as a shipping port for cotton.  In the Civil War it served as an arsenal for the confederacy and used as a prison for captured Union soldiers.
Luckily Sherman spared Macon on his march to the sea when all the other cities were sacked and burned.

As most cities Macon suffered from the flight to the suburbs and the city became empty.  I could not fins any information on the restoration of the huge downtown but it is amazing.  A couple of more hours of walking around looking at all the buildings and then driving around gazing at the lovely mansions with their very well manicured lawns meant we were not getting any further than Macon for the night.  I must say that for a large city I have never seen one so clean. Even in the parts of town that tended to be a little shabby there was no trash in the street and everything looked neat and clean.

The Macon Trains Station