2/13/22 St. Simon's Island, Kingsland Georgia.

 2/13/22 Sunday

Today we decide to take 82E over to St. Simon's Island on the east coast of Georgia.  We'd been to Jekyl Island before, so decide to try St. Simon's today. The day is a bit overcast and in the 50's.

First stop is Fort Frederica National Monument, the remains of a fort built by the British  in 1736,  seeking to lay claim to the area, as was Spain.  

 The Spanish invaded in 1742 but were turned back. There were about 1,000 people living here in the 1740's. We are in luck today because there are a group of re-enactors demonstrating blacksmithing, weaving, cooking. Families who settled here were given one year of provisions and then expected to be self-sufficient. 

He was cooking Bruswick Stew, named for the nearby town of Brunswick.  Brunswick was famous for its tasty tomatoes, which form the base of stew. Assorted veggies and whatever meat was available were also used.  They spun mostly wool, as cotton was extremely work intensive removing all those seeds before Eli Whitney's gin was invented.

After chatting with them for a while, we find that they are volunteers through the National Park service.  They are RVers who have been trained in different skills and travel to various parks doing demonstrations in return for free hookups and sometimes a small stipend.

Not much remains of the fort and the town that grew up around it, though they have identified the foundations of different buildings and who lived in many of them.  Much of the construction was done with a material called "tabby", that was a concrete-like material made from shells burned to ash and mixed with sand, lime and water. Lots of pieces of shell are still visible in the material. 

Huge oak trees draped with Spanish moss and a few orange and other trees. The Spanish moss was used to stuff mattresses.  Henry Ford actually used it in his first few vehicles, but quickly learned that it is a favorite home for chiggers and had to be treated before being usable.

 Next, we visit St. Simon's lighthouse and keepers' dwelling.   In 1934 it was converted to electricity and no longer needed a keeper.  It continues to be an active aid to navigation!

Nearby is a nice garden and cross dedicated to John and Charles Wesley, Anglican priests in Georgia and founders of the Methodism.

We stopped briefly at the remains of some slave cabins built by slaves in the early 1800's.  They were part of a cotton plantation named Hamilton. Each served two families, with a central chimney that gave each family a hearth.

En route to Kingsland, where we've reserved a hotel for the night, we cross the Satilla River and stop at the Still River Waterfront Park and walk a long boardwalk between the river and a marshy wooded area.

Greg thought the sign for this antique shop was kind of unique.  It was Shut (Not Open).

Tonight we head to the Sleep Inn in Kingsland, Georgia to do laundry, and join a family zoom call. We had dinner at a local bar-b-q place, which was pretty good, and then settled in to watch the Super Bowl.  Rams beat Cincinnati Bengals but it was a good game!  Nice, clean, comfy hotel.  Nice long hot showers!

2/12/22 Pebble Hill Plantation, Okefenokee Swamp, GA

 2/12 Saturday

We set out this morning across 84E, known as the Wiregrass Georgia Highway.  Lots more pine trees and bundled pine needles - we'll see them used later as mulch in Florida.

We come to the town of Thomasville  and swing by "The Big Oak", this 300+ year old tree 

before driving down a beautiful main street!  Gotta take a picture of these gorgeous homes and Episcopal church....

Lovely courthouse, too.

We googled bakeries for a quick breakfast and ended up parking in front of some of those mansions and walking to the Savannah Moon Cafe for breakfast. Cute little place and very busy!  I ended up with grits and bacon which were very good (I'm a convert) while Greg had a ham and egg breakfast sandwich. 

Today we are headed to nearby Pebble Hill Plantation. Since plantations were such a way of life in the south for so long, we figured we should see at least one this trip. Quite a nice driveway!  Huge oaks dripping with Spanish moss.  

 This one was built in 1825 and produced mainly cotton and sugar cane.   We were in a small group of 7 with our guide, Paul, who really knew his stuff!  The plantation began small but expanded considerably when the founder's daughter married Howard Melvin Hammon, a magnate in coal and shipping in the north.  There were 70 plantations in this area. To qualify as a plantation, a home must have 2,000 acres minimum.  Pebble Hill has 3,000.

Front

Back

 

Camellias in red, pink, white and yellow were blooming beautifully!

A few early azaleas too!

Part of the reason this area was so popular was that Thomasville advertised as being far enough south for a mild climate, good clean air improved respiratory problems, yet far enough north to avoid malaria and other diseases which were a problem.  Land back then was $3 an acre! He alluded to the "cottages" we took pictures of earlier on Dawson Street, built mostly by wealthy Northerners as Winter homes.  Many of the furnishings and the modern conveniences arrived from the north.

There were slaves at this plantation, house slaves and field slaves, but not much was said about this.  He did add that sharecropping helped keep the property intact after the Civil War.  We toured each room.  Turkey and quail hunting was popular here and there were dozens of turkey paintings and 33 original Audubon paintings. Mr. Hammon agreed with Ben Franklin that the turkey should have represented the new country.  There was a fire in 1934 in which only one wing was saved, so much of what we were seeing was more recent.  This is the "old" wing which was saved by a bucket brigade.

By 1936, electricity, heating and cooling were installed.  Some notable things we saw were a collection of walking sticks including one that concealed a flask, another that concealed a gun.  The spiral staircase was quite beautiful.  There was a staff of 10-12 servants. 

The second floor of the home was a gallery of art collected by Elizabeth Ireland Poe, including this Carousel Horse from 1922.

The grounds were  quite lovely, including this family cemetery.

and this entrance to a tennis court. Not exactly the plantation we were expecting, but interesting.

Spring is coming.

Back to 84E and onward to the Okefenokee Swamp Park in Waycross, Georgia.  Today has been overcast, but no rain until we reached our destination.  Even then it was just a light rain for 15-20 minutes.  We had called and got tickets for the last boat tour of the day and it was just Greg and I and our guide, Joe, in a small open boat.

The rain in the dark water was kind of beautiful!

Okefenokee is a Seminole Indian word meaning "land of trembling earth", referring to the often less than stable footing in the area not covered by water. We are at the top of the Okefenokee Swamp which is also the beginning of the Swanee River.  From here it flows 50 miles down to the Gulf of Mexico. The swamp covers 700 square miles and is 90% government protected.

Joe says there are 234 bird species, and, of course many alligators. 30 snake species, plus bear, deer, bobcats and other small mammals. He pointed out a couple of old alligator nests, where the females will lay 3-4 dozen eggs.  They incubate for 65-70 days and the mother alligator will tend to the young ones for over a year. It was still pretty cool to see much activity, but they did have some large gators in an enclosed area with a boardwalk above.

The water is dark because of tannic acid from decaying vegetation and is only 6-8 inches deep on the boat trails.  There is quite a labrynth of trails, some very narrow, and it is easy to get lost.  Joe has lived and worked here for a long time and was involved in clearing, building docks and boardwalks, etc.  Lots of stories.  

We stopped and walked a boardwalk to Skull Lake, which is Seminole Indian hallowed ground where they would sacrifice animals twice a year.  They had their ceremony and then mounted the animal skull to a tree. 

 Joe pointed out different plants that were used for medicine, soap and other practical things. To tell how old a cypress tree is, he says stand next to it. Measure the circumference at shoulder height and multiply by 12. There are 22 carnivorous plants found in the swamp - lots of food (insects) too.  Fortunately the temperature is cool, so we don't see any (insects).

There are a few other things to do here - nature center, train, etc. - but it is nearly their closing time by the time we finish the tour, so we pick up a few post cards for the grandkids and head to town.

Because, I suppose, the Swamp draws quite a few visitors, the usual Walmart, Cracker Barrel do not allow boondocking. ( Some towns pass ordinances so that their area $ campgrounds get more business.) We notice a Lowe's, however, whose manager says it is fine to stay there. 

Snacks and soup.  Good night! 

2/11/22 Tuskegee AL into Georgia

2/11/22 Friday

 34 degrees this morning.  We have breakfast and head to the Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site. We are fortunate that they are open Fridays and Saturdays.  We arrive a little early, but someone in the parking lot explains the layout.  The museum is located in 2 hangars at Morton Field.

We drive to an area overlooking the airfield where there are placards giving a brief story of this field.  More than 10,000 black men and women served as support personnel to the 992 pilots trained here; including navigators, bombardiers, mechanics, instructors, crew chiefs, nurses and cooks.

It was the 1940's and just about every area of life was strictly segregated.  Not everyone was supportive of Tuskegee.  The Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 prohibited discrimination in training for military service  and it, together with pressure from the black press, civil rights organizations and even Eleanor Roosevelt, led to the establishment of the segregated 99th Pursuit Squadron in 1941. African Americans from all over the US came here to train. The first hangar has a brief film and then deals with the training aspect.  At numerous spots there are phones which you can pick up to hear individuals who were involved here speak.

 Tuskegee's Morton Field was used for primary training and the nearby Tuskegee Army Air Field was used for basic and advanced training. The cadets were housed at nearby Tuskegee Institute.

Training was rigorous and the airmen realized they had something to prove.  They became some of the top pilots in the US.  The second hangar talks of their accomplishments during the war, when their planes, tipped nose and tail in red, often escorted bombers. 

 

 They were so accomplished that they were often requested as escorts. 992 pilots were trained and 66 were killed in combat. Overall the airmen destroyed 251 enemy planes and received 150 distinguished flying crosses. 

The George Washington Carver museum in Tuskegee is closed for renovations, so we continue east into  the Eastern Time Zone. We visit the Eufaula Nat'l Wildlife Refuge on the Chatahoochee River. But they are doing a lot of controlled burns - hardly condusive to wildlife viewing.  We take a short walk and see one bald eagle.

 

Housing is ranging from trailer homes, to tumbledown, to gorgeous!

Hello Georgia!  We pass cotton fields, pecan orchards, and more of the pines that took over lots of plantation areas after WWII. The pines are planted at widths that allow quick growth and easy harvesting.

This small patch of cotton apparently didn't get picked, so we break off a piece to take home to show the grandkids.

This "sign" farm was an interesting distraction!

Next we took a little detour to see the southernmost covered bridge at Coheelee Creek.

Tonight we stop at a Walmart in Bainbridge, Georgia. Quiet night.