Family, fun, and food

It wasn't long before we were leaving sunny Florida behind and had hit the road again, this time with North Carolina in mind as our end goal. Not ones to pass up a good road trip, we thought a little side trip to Savannah, Georgia was in order. 2 hours, 9 cop car sitings, and 15 bridges passed later, we were finally at our Savannah hotel!
Savannah was gorgeous--we couldn't wait to go downtown! Wanting to stretch my legs a little I confidently suggested to Matt that we should walk there.
Of course when I said that though I was thinking more like 20 or 30 minutes--after all, it looked pretty close on the map and I was sure I had read somewhere on the hotel's website that we were only a mere 15 minutes from historic downtown.
The problem started when we realized that it had already taken all of our 30 minutes getting from one street to the other on the map. Hmm...alas, if we had only realized the stupidity of my suggestion then...but oh no, we trudged on, convinced that downtown was only a mere 15 minutes away.

After hour number one we had come to two conclusions: 1) Savannah is beautiful. 2) Downtown was not 20 minutes away.
We had two options at this point: give up and turn around or trudge on. That's when my plan subtly changed: the new goal became let's get to downtown as soon as possible and then catch a taxi on the way back so we could pick up our rental car. (After all what downtown doesn't have taxis at 7:00 in the evening?) Confidently we began asking local-looking people whether there were any buses nearby or if there was a specific spot to catch a taxi downtown. Unfortunately, their only intelligent response was to stare at us blank-faced and mumble something about that kinda thing not being around here.

By 7:30 we finally stumbled onto the edge of the map square marked "Historic Downtown". Undaunted, we asked again about the taxis/buses. But alas this time we were to be quickly deflated because the man's response was something like "Oh, that bus right there (passing us on the side of the street) was the last bus for the night and you won't find any taxis around here at this time of night." For crying out loud people it was only 7:30pm! And here I had thought to escape the Paris metro for the summer, ah the irony of it all...
In order to avoid meltdown, Matt and I decided to game plan our next move over dinner at a small cafe that we had stumbled onto. Although outrageously expensive (we were only able to afford a bowl of soup and drinks) it thankfully happened to be outrageously delicious which perked our Savannah spirits up a bit. We decided that due to safety reasons and energy levels our only hope was to walk as fast as possible back to the hotel, grab the rental, and hope to see a little of historic Savannah before the sun went down. Thus the speed-walking Sanders took off in hopes of making it to the hotel in only one hour as opposed to the 2 1/2 it had taken us to get there thus far.

And for about 20 min we really thought we might be able to pull it off. But something magic happened: just as our taut elbows were slowly drooping and my prayers were increasing, Matt happened to spot a taxi flying by. Like stranded islanders we both began jumping and waving like crazy in a last attempt to woo the car back to us. And unlike other moments in our life, this was one of those times where our plan actually worked, desperation payed off and we were soon chatting thankfully with our very friendly Savannah taxi driver (of course, with the accent and all we had a pretty hard time understanding him but hey, we weren't about to complain...)

Now with rental car a safe 100 yards away we were able to enjoy that famous downtown we had dreamed so much of during our previous trek...

My fav of course was the candy store...check out those caramel apples above...

Unfortunately the picture of these yummy things was the only thing I could afford in the shop...


We needed a picture to document the fact that we had actually made it to the city center.

I almost joined these young'uns for a dash in the water but I knew Matt was looking and would reel me back to my seat...

We also made friends during our short jaunt in the city... This is an Indian fellow I met in one of the shops. What do you think of my facial expression imitating?

It wasn't long before we were "on the rooooaad again..." Feeling the need to taste test for ourselves some real Southern cookin' we made a pit stop at the Waffle House for some of the goods.

And before long (ok, actually it felt like forever in the car, but you know) we were in North Carolina, home to the second half of the family! I knew that when Matt's aunt Kathy came out hugging, "Hey sugaring" and offering sweet tea, we were in for a real treat in Southern hospitality.

Here we are really excited to see the corn fields pictured below...

Welcome to LaGrange, North Carolina.

After hardly knowing these people (I had met some briefly at Matt's and my wedding) it didn't take long to feel part of the family. I had a special admirer with Matt's cousin's oldest little girl. "A" (name erased because she hopes to someday be part of the CIA) was at my side within five minutes "Hey-ing" me (that's the done thing there instead of 'hi') and was asking me to check out her cartwheeling action. After bonding over the cartwheeling (lets just say I was very much in awe because it's a skill I've never quite mastered), we moved on to more girl talk things...such as clothes, shoes, hairstyles and the like. (apparently she's quite fond of skirts and when I walked through the door wearing one it was an instant friendship) She's got pretty good taste for a four year old. Not one to want to play favorites though here I am bonding with younger sister "P" (I could tell you her name but then she'd have to kill you).

Here we are hanging out on the front steps of the house. If I look tired it's because I am. We played Duck, Duck, Goose with A and P; as it turns out A has got a good set of legs on her and in no time had me pooped on the porch.
That's when it became Matt's turn for a little action. I'm not sure exactly what part of Duck, Duck, Goose is pictured here (maybe it's the extreme, catch you version) but they appear to be having fun...

Then the Kodak moment once everyone is officially tuckered out...

And lastly a group shot: there's the whole gang except Matt's cousin's husband and me, of course, who's taking the shot...