plans? who needs plans?

Hola!

I'm writing you from Cancun, Mexico. We decided we're tired of all the thunderstorms forcing us to change our plans at the last minute, so we decided to just leave the country.

Okay, so not really. I'm actually in Asheville, NC which is where we had planned on being today. Which is pretty much the first time in two days we've been on "schedule". We decided with all the storms that were going through that getting on the Parkway would not be a good idea. Pretty much right after I clicked "publish" on my last post, Cody went down to the desk to extend our stay another night in Savannah. We had another enjoyable day walking around Savannah, took a riverboat cruise (I'm still kinda salty about that), and had an awesome dinner.

Paula Deen is a pretty big deal in Georgia, and Savannah in particular. She owns a restaraunt there with her two sons, and people line up for hours to eat there. We, however went to her brothers restaraunt farther out in the coastal marshes. They specialize in seafood, which was one of Cody's goals while we were in the south: we HAD to eat at a seafood joint that served fresh seafood. This place was awesome. Fantastic views and even better food. Uncle Bubba's. I highly recommend you try it.

From there we drove out to Tybee Island, which is at the mouth of the Savannah River (and a few more coastal rivers and creeks). Awesome beach. We hung out on the pier for a while, where I got to see a fisherman pull in a skate (think baby stingray, like what you get to pet at zoo exhibits), and Cody took some pretty ridiculous pictures of the surfers. We were there right before the peak of high tide, so there were a lot of people surfing. We walked the beach for a bit, and while Cody took more pictures, I acted like an 8 year old and hunted shells.

Yesterday we went back to the island to tour the lighthouse and keepers houses. We climbed all 178 stairs to top, at which point Cody went out on the catwalk to enjoy the view and take some pictures. My ass stayed firmly planted in the safe confines of the stairwell.

On to the beach again, where Cody finally got the chance to get in the ocean and wade around and body surf a bit. I don't like getting in natural bodies of water over my knees, so I just waded around and checked out the tidal pools since it was low tide this time around.

Then it was on to Fort Pulaski, which I can't really describe. It's nothing like Fort Meigs in Perrysburg that we're all so familiar with. We got some really good pictures that I will hopefully post some time this year so you can see for yourself. The bonus of that trip was the alligator in the moat that surrounds the fort. Yes! I real, live alligator in the wild! We were stoked at that!

The rest of the day was the ho-hum drive from Georgia to North Carolina. Today I'll be touring Biltmore (again!) while Cody putters around Asheville all day. With any luck, the gardens will still be in bloom and I'll be snapping pictures like a botanical papparazzi!

We'll be staying here again tonight, and HOPEFULLY the weather will hold out in the morning so we can actually do the last portion of the Blue Ridge Parkway on our way to Gatlinburg. It's the highest and most beautiful portion of the parkway (the whole thing is gorgeous, but the mountain views can't be beat on this portion). Since it's so high, if it's cloudy, we're going to have to skip it, and I'm probably going to pout.

Time to strap on my fanny pack and camera bag and play the role of tourist I love so well!