July 31, 2003

Today was Min and my first full day in Savannah together. We got up a little bit late this morning and headed out for the Waffle House for some breakfast. After getting some food in our tummies, we went to the Savanna visitor’s center and booked a trolley tour of the city. We started the tour around noon and it took an hour and a half to travel around the historic district seeing all of the major site. Savannah is a really neat town with a ton of really interesting history. Savannah was occupied by the British in the Revolutionary War (or the “War of Southern Aggression to our Canadian readers) and again by the Union in the Civil War (or the “War of Northern Aggression” to our southern readers.) It had a number of major fires and epidemics over the years. We had a good time on the tour and learned quite a bit. We got off the tour at the end and walked around the city for a little while and did some window shopping. Then we walked down to the Owen-Thomas house, the oldest example of British Regency architecture in the New World as well as America’s first home with indoor plumbing. The plumbing system was fed by water collected on the roof and stored in four large cisterns. The house was built in 1816. The house was interesting but there wasn’t much to do on the house tour and since that was touted as being the best house tour in the whole city, we decided to limited our house tours to this one. It is a beautiful house, though.

After the tour, we ran back along the trolley tour route and caught the trolley again. It took us close to the city market so we hopped off the trolley and walked down to the market to see about some lunch. We ate lunch at “Tapas” in the market. It was really good and not nearly as expensive as Ithaca. It was very reminiscent of “Just a Taste” in Ithaca.

We hit the hotel and the mall for about two hours after dinner and then drove out to the island to see the family for the evening. Michael is really into Anime and got Joe’s girlfriend Brittany yesterday watching Princess Mononoke and Serial Experiments: Lain. So Min and I picked up Ah! My Goddess: The Movie while we were at the mall so that we would have something new to watch. We watched Kiki’s Delivery Service but near the end the movie stopped playing (I am hoping that it is the player and not the DVD itself) so we didn’t get to finish it. So we started watched Ah! My Goddess instead.

July 30, 2003

Today was a short day. Min and I slept in really, really late. We didn’t get up until early afternoon. But at least we managed to get a full night of sleep so we were doing okay once we were up. We drove out to Tybee Island as soon as we were awake and visited with Min’s family for a while. There are a ton of people hanging out at the house that they rented out here.

Min’s dad, Min, Francesca and I went out for a walking “Haunted Savannah” tour. It started from Colonial Cemetary (where the cockroaches run rampant) and winds through the historic district. The tour took about 90 minutes and the tour guide was really good. We had a really good time on the tour. Our guide was very knowledgable about the history of Savannah. The tour was actually very informative about historical Savannah with a morbid twist on the history. Our guide informed us that you have to be licensed to be a tour guide in Savannah. We thought that that was a pretty good idea. It helps to make sure that tours in the city are more reliable and consistent.

Min and I went to Waffle House to have some dinner and then headed off to the hotel.

July 29, 2003

Driving day. I got up at 8:00 am and did some packing and cleaning around the house. I had a bit that I needed to do before I was able to get on the road. I discovered a lead in the plumbing that really didn’t make my day any easier too. So I had to deal with that the best that I could before I could leave. I went to Taco Bell in Geneseo and got some lunch before hitting the long road south around 11:30. I had been hoping to be driving by 9:00 but I am not so lucky. I took the western route south taking US390 to NY36 to US86. I took 216 into Pennsylvania and then 119 around Pittsburgh and into West Virginia. From Morgantown I took US79 down to WV19 and then US77 all the way through Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina until I could hop onto US95 down to Savannah. The trip went pretty well and the route was easy. I arrived in Savannah at 3:30 am. It took almost another hour to drive out to Tybee Island from the city. So I picked Min up around 4:30 and we managed to get back to the hotel around 5:30. So, I was pretty tired by the time I finally got there. I was really glad to be able to collapse into bed.

July 27, 2003

Today is the absolute last day of moving. Andy and I have to drive down to Ithaca to finish up with the house. We had quite a bit of stuff that we had to leave behind last time we were down there.

I took Min to the airport this morning so that she can fly down to Savannah to spend the week with her family down there. They all drove down there on Friday but we were obviously a little bit busy then. It was really nice to be able to drive from the house to the airport in just twenty minutes. I have never lived in such a convenient location to everything. Our spot in Geneseo is really handy.

From the airport I headed straight down to Ithaca and started packing. I beat Andy down by about thirty minutes. We loaded my car up until it was riding pretty low and then loaded Andy’s car full of bulky items that we then ran up to Nate’s place in Trumansburg so that we would have enough room in the cars to get everything that we needed back to Geneseo. Andy hadn’t seen Nate’s house yet so he got the tour. After a quick tour it was back to Varna for some more packing. We got Andy’s car all packed and drove back to Geneseo. We got back around 9:30 pm. Tanner was sitting in the parking lot waiting for us. He hadn’t been there too long. Tanner even brought us some Guiness and some ice to keep it cool. He helped us unload the two cars and then we enjoyed the Guiness. Andy and I are SO relieved to finally be done with all of the moving. It has been way too much moving over the last few days. I can’t handle anymore.