Savannah, Georgia

Well, today is a vacation. Of course it includes getting up late, eating breakfast in the room and then going to hang out in the pool. It was very hot, but cloudy, though one of us (who hasn’t been to the beach since our Bahamas vacation two years ago) still managed to get a bit sun burned…but still, it was a perfect weather for a pool day. Omri had fun in the water with his new floatation ring, and so did we.

Savannah is a port city which used to be the capital of the south because it has a huge and very active harbor (even today), but it lost its glory when Atlanta built all the railroads.

In the afternoon we took the ferry to the historic Savannah district across the river, it was a cool short ride. Savannah is beautiful and very different. It doesn’t seem American at all but more of a port city in Italy. It is historic all right. We took a walk at the harbor and visited city market where there were plenty of cafes and live music, we ate and got back to the hotel in the late evening. Then, since the pool was still open we went for a night swim, which was really cool. When we got back to the room I (Ravit) was busy criticizing Eilat hotels for not keeping pools open late and having a low temperature (here the pool temperature is great), anyway, while criticizing Israeli pools, a huge ZIM boat suddenly passed through the river, and we cheered for it because we were so happy to see an Israeli boat here. Like we told one lady today, who asked us why we are going back to Israel – it is home. You criticize it but you miss it. Still, in the meantime we really want to continue having fun here!

Well Well Well. Today we decided to tour Savannah, specifically the historic part. It’s view is so beautiful right across the river from the hotel. It turns out the weather is not always so great here, and on the way to the museum we got stuck in heavy rain showers. We were sure we would see a great museum that would explain a lot about southern traditions, since Savannah was originally a large center with a harbor. But we saw a small, not very informative museum (we should have figured because it cost us only 10 dollars). One ridiculous thing we found out was that when you try to learn about slavery history – every town blames the neighbors. For example, Atlanta blamed Savannah and Savannah blames South Carolina for bringing slaves to America. Who will South Carolina blame? According to Savannah’s information, the person who founded it (who built Savannah for Christians only, obviously all Wight people those days) was convinced slaves would be necessary for economical reasons. We are wondering who the hell is the person that started with this awful idea and decided people are doomed to be slaves because they had darker skin. Although those were different times, it still is pretty cruel. As for these days, Savannah seems to be pretty poor compared to Atlanta and Macon, and that’s probably why it doesn’t live to its’ full potential as a vacation plus culture and history destination. It’s surprising because water cities usually are, but maybe that’s just the historic district. As for us – we decided to go back to the pool, until it started raining again. Tomorrow we’re going to Florida.