Another beautiful day here in the Savannah area. After my usual morning routine it was off to the big city to see what there was to see. No problems getting into town as it is less than 10 miles away from where I am camping. The only real problem was in dealing with the high traffic on the very narrow streets and the lack of easy parking spots around the river area. It appears likely that the city makes quite a bit of revenue off parking down there as there seemed to be no unmetered parking at all, and over the course of the half day I was down there, I managed to see 8 parking enforcement people walking around checking. No problem for me though, I found a public parking garage off the river area a couple of blocks, and found plenty of room 4 levels down under the outside world.


    Wandered the streets for about an hour trying to get my bearings. One thing on my list was the 'Ships of the Sea Maritime Museum', and I finally ran across it in my ramblings. Spent several hours there looking at all of the displays and reading all the info plaques. The museum is geared towards showing how shipping has been such an integral part of the Savannah area from the first start. Lot's of really cool boat models of some of the more important boats associated with this area, from small wooden sailboats all the way up to WWII destroyer and cruisers. What was most impressive is that some of these models were huge. One large sailboat had to be over 12' long with masts and sails that were more than 10' tall. Lucky for the museum they had an atrium that extended all the way up to the roof so they didn't actually hit the ceiling with the tops of the masts.


    There were other exhibits worth looking at of course, including a really fine collection of original scrimshaw and a whole display case of 'ships in a bottle'. Also there were some interesting displays of old navigation instruments as well as a whole case of ship building tools. Of course the best thing was the gift shop up front. I came across a short movie from the History Channel on the 'Boats of the Coast Guard', which I watched this evening. I even saw someone in it I vaguely knew when I was in way back when. Of course he is now a Senior Chief Bosun's Mate, where as when I knew him he was a lowly BM3.


    I also discovered a cool little book of knots while in the store, one that I had never seen before. What drew me to it was that it had lots of variations on other knots I already know, but these just make some of them even better. For instance; there is one called a 'Boom Hitch' which is a simple derivation of a clove hitch, but much better for tying a rope to a fixed object under tension. Also a 'Figure of 8 Bend and Hitch' as well as a Stevedores Knot', and something they called a 'Simple Simon' knot. I'm going to have to break out a couple pieces of rope now and start practicing again. That's good though cus I was getting a bit rusty anyway.


   Walked the length of Bay Street after having a bite to eat. I really good shrimp por' boy with fries and a mug of ice cold New Moon beer at a place called Annie's. Good eats and the beer was sensational. Frosty cold and brewed just down the street from where I ate.


   One of the reasons for walking down the waterfront, other than it's just neat, was that there was suppose to be this old iron lighthouse along there somewhere. I found it right at the east end of the park along Bay Street and took a few pictures. I guess it was once used to guide ships up the Savannah River and into the docks along the edge of the river. It looks like a really tall iron street lamp with a larger than average globe light on the top. A sign said that it was very helpful in showing boats the clear channel up the river after the British sunk a bunch of ships in the river to blockade it. Unfortunately the light no longer functions as it once did, but it did look pretty neat.


    Started a new book tonight and watched a couple Robin Hood episodes as well as the Coast Guard DVD. I'm hoping it is nice again tomorrow as I have plans to go over to Tybee Island and check out a couple more lighthouses. But I'm hearing that it is likely going to rain so I may just end up hanging out and working on some more photo's. Either way it a win as far as I'm concerned.