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January 2001

South Carolina/Georgia - Low Country

David Aaronson
2005-09-25 19:09:40

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movie 'Forrest Gump', it isn't too surprising. It was filmed at several locations nearby.

The next morning we went to Hilton Head to see what it was. We mostly expected an overdeveloped resort island and a beach lined with high-rise condos and hotels. Actually it turned out to be an overdeveloped resort island and beach with secluded resorts and an infinite number of gated subdivisions with golf courses designed by the PGA celebrity of your choice. Either way, the beaches are leash-free for dogs under voice control between October and March so Trout enjoyed it. There's really nothing else to say about that.

Here is a crab that Trout met (4). Both Trout and the crab have short attention spans so the meeting was brief and uneventful. There seems to be pretty good shelling along Hilton Head Island but the vast majority of shells are quite small. The island has two public beaches and we visited them both. They really aren't much different but we'd recommend the one at the north end of the island because the parking area is nicer and there is more parking available. Plus you're less likely to be killed in traffic returning to your car from the beach.

Not far south of Hilton Head is the city of Savannah, Georgia. Savannah is one of the oddest towns you can expect to find yourself in, though it is very picturesque. The city was thoughtfully laid out with 25 grassy squares left as parks. Over the years since its founding, three of the parks have been lost but the rest remain. Here is Trout in the Garden of Good and Evil. Or if you prefer, 5 of Savannah's parks. This first is Reynolds Square (5). The statue in the center is of John Wesley (founder of Methodism).

This is Johnson Square, the first square of the Savannah plan (6). Robert Johnson was a governor of South Carolina which is actually across the river but he gets a square in Savannah anyway. The statue you can't see on top of the column is of Nathaniel Greene.

Wright Square features more squirrels per capita than any other Savannah square according to Trout (7). According to local history, it was named for Sir James Wright, a colonial General and the monument honors William Washington Gordon. If you're starting to suspect Savannah has monuments to a lot of people you're on the right track but you're probably an order of magnitude off still.

This is Chippewa square, named after the Battle of Chippewa which happened in not-very-nearby Canada (8). Go figure. This monument is William Oglethorpe the founder of the Georgia colony who was important enough to be sculpted by Daniel Chester French. Trout is suitably impressed

Sociologists have determined that more than five of these pictures would likely cause you, the reader, to glaze over and pass out on your keyboard. So this is the last one for now. This is called Oglethorpe Square even though the statue of Oglethorpe was in Chippewa Square (9). So what, there is also a Greene square which doesn't feature the statue of Nathaniel Greene. This square feature the house in the background which is historic because maybe, just maybe the Marquis de Lafayette stayed there once as a guest. Maybe. The supporting evidence for such a visit is described as 'Savannah oral tradition'. The Savannah mentality about this is basically that if you don't accept it, you shouldn't really be living in Savannah. We were just passing through so we leave the veracity of such things as an exercise to the industrious reader.