Day 62 - Savannah to Charleston

Today we left our very basic campground and headed to Charleston. The ride was nice - lots of forested areas along the highway. Not a long drive, just a couple of hours. We arrived in a better-than-expected campground about 12 miles from the historical downtown. We wanted to be closer but everything had already been booked by the time we looked at places a few days ago.

After arriving in the campground we had a nice lunch and then looked up free walking tours of the historical town. We like to take these walking tours as soon as we get into a new city and have done this in European cities as well. This way get an orientation to the area and can better decide what to see again more in depth. The "free" tours require an online reservation, sometimes free, sometimes a few dollars for the local tour tax. Then the tour guide takes you around town and you tip at the end the amount you want. We have found these tours to be really good. Today's tours are already over so we found one free for $2, a self-guided audio tour, Atlantis Audio Tour, available from the Play Store. So we download the app, head downtown and start the tour!

The tour starts at the site of the oldest church in town, St Philips. This church has been rebuilt over the years but was started by an Anglican congregation in 1680. There are colonial governors and revolutionary war people buried there.

The Dock street theater building is thought to be the first theater in the US built in 1730.

The french Huguenots have had a church in this location since 1687. This latest rebuild happened in 1844.

The "pink house" is the second longest continually occupied residence (without having been rebuilt) in town, dating from 1712. Note the real gas lamps in use in this neighborhood!

It is interesting to see so much more simple architecture we guess dating from the 1700's rather than the more common Victorian style that seemed more prevalent in downtown Savannah.

The "confederate house" was built after the civil war to house spouses of soldiers who died in battle. According to the internet, it is still used to house some otherwise homeless women.

Old tree root systems really growing!

Nice cobble stone streets here and there.

Historic old indoor slave market, now a museum.

By the 1770's the population was 12000, with half being enslaved people. This was a real center of slave commerce, in one year over 7000 enslaved people passed though this port to other parts of the colonies. This building was the center of all commerce with the river behind.

A little away from the commerce center is a series of colonial houses near the shore called the rainbow row.

Looking out into the bay.

More interesting small streets between old houses.