Avoiding fast, heavy traffic and enjoying scenery such as this along the way. Richmond Hill, just outside Savannah was our stop for the night.
And since we didn't have reservations, we were on the lookout for a likely-looking motel. Bud spotted this Scottish Inn which advertised 'Senior Rates' and clean rooms. What a deal. It was one of the cheaper places we stayed and the room rate and ambiance were great.
Savannah wasn't our main destination for the day, but I at least wanted to drive around it a bit. No time for one of the celebrated "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" tours. I felt we could find the area on our own and thought we had when I saw this square across the street from those picturesque row houses.
But instead of Bonaventure Cemetery, we had happened upon Johnson Square Cemetery. So we wandered around it for awhile, reading interesting plaques and tombs.
I didn't write anything down about this tombstone. I liked the juxtaposition of the old gravestone, fence, brick tombs in the background and the Spanish moss.
The square was more like a park than a cemetery. Beautiful flowering trees, pathways, benches upon which to sit and perhaps contemplate one's own mortality. Many of the graves were very old, dating back to men famous from the Revolutionary War and important to the founding of Savannah.
One of my favorite's was this "Duellist's Grave" marker for James Wilde's tomb. His brother was the poet, Richard Henry Wilde. You may have heard or read these opening lines:
"My life is like the Summer Rose
That opens to the morning sky;
But ere the shades of evening close
Is scattered on the ground to die."
Savannah is one of those places I wouldn't mind having several days to explore. But it wasn't on my 'must see' list for this trip. I was content with the brief visit. On to Charleston! It was on my list.
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