My time with my friend Sara was A-W-E-S-O-M-E!!! It was so good to catch up and chat A LOT! Sara introduced me to some great American and Southern food and culture including The Cheesecake Factory, Chick-fil-a chicken biscuits, Waffle House, Mexican food, and The Swan House. We didn’t just eat though!!! Sara showed me around Atlanta and we went to the Coca-Cola museum (Coca-Cola started in Atlanta) and I tried all 64 flavours of coke products from around the world, some of which were truly disgusting!
I got to meet lots of Sara’s friends who welcomed me into their homes which was so great and so generous of them. I managed to teach a 4 year old a bit of a British accent. Sara took me to a basketball game in Athens which I thought was awesome with the American sport, the cheerleaders, the mascots, and the band.
And we went to Nashville and enjoyed a night of very good country music at Tootsies.
We visited the Jack Daniels distillery where every bottle of JD is made...and all this in a dry county!
We went to dinner with a bunch of Sara’s friends in a lovely restaurant in Atlanta. And I got to meet Sara’s family and be treated to really such a hospitable and great southern experience. Thank you Sara!!!
Houston
After that amazing time, I flew to Houston to see my friend Anslie. It was great to catch up with her and especially to get to meet her husband and her ridiculously cute daughter. It was a much more relaxed pace which was great after all we had squeezed into my stay in and around Atlanta. I spent most of the days feeling a bit under the weather with a heavy cold and what turned into a sinus infection so didn’t make use of all the exercise equipment in her very nice apartment building. It was great to have time with Anslie and her daughter, chat to her mum on skype, go to the shops, read, plan some stuff for the next stages of my adventure and reflect. We ate some great food including my first Korean BBQ, but the highlight event for me has to be the Rodeo. This is a big event and we got to go in the day to where they have various cattle competitions and such. It was weird for me to be in a massive building and for there to be cows just there, inside, hanging out. There were sheep and goats, rabbits and chickens, and even a birthing place with newly born piglets. There were tractors and cowboy paraphernalia for sale and of course all manner of true American fast food options.
We then got to go in the evening and see wagon racing, calf catching and kiddie sheep rodeo version. It was hilarious!!! Then a stage was brought out into the middle of the dirt stadium and a country music band came out and performed! A great time! Thanks, Anslie, for all your generosity and for such a great stay in Texas!
Chapel Hill
Onto Chapel Hill to see my family... It was great to see them and get to spend some time with my cousin and hear her play her violin. She got to laugh at my mal-coordination at Frisbee throwing and laugh together at various pop songs and TV series. I got to spend time with my uncle and aunt with walks in the local gardens, around Chapel Hill, and at various yummy restaurants. It was great too, to make use of their gym and pool. A great weekend, thank you!
Chapel Hill – Outer Banks – Wilmington – Myrtle Beach – Charleston – Savannah – Okefenokee – Tampa
From Chapel Hill, I rented a car and took a few days to drive to Tampa to see another friend. My first day, I drove to the Outer Banks and enjoyed some exploring on beaches in this incredible landscape. It was great to have made some CDs from my playlists to listen to on my roadtrip and of course sing my heart out to!
The next day I went for a run in the rain and then onto the Wright museum, set up at the site where the Wright brothers took their first flights ever. Very interesting especially considering that some of the principles seem quite obvious now somehow. Then onto Wilmington, which is a beautiful town. Of course for me it was extra exciting because it is where Dawson’s Creek and more particularly, One Tree Hill, are filmed! Various other movies have scenes that are filmed here too and it really a quiet and unassuming kind of place. It was a beautiful afternoon when I got there, so I had a walk around downtown on the river and sat outside for dinner.
The next day it was off to Savannah! A much longer drive than the previous days, but a beautiful day and I stopped for a walk along the beach at Myrtle Beach – an interesting place, kind of like Benidorm and with an alarmingly high number of fantasy crazy golf places with huge dinosaurs, mountains, coloured waterfalls etc.
Then onto Charleston in South Carolina – a really amazing town with its big southern plantation type homes all next to each other and all by the water. The climate was starting to get a lot warmer and more humid down here and it kind of reminded me of India with its somewhat colonial feel. I took a lovely walking route around the centre. Then onwards to Savannah...a bit surreal here...I arrived around sunset and was slightly surprised by the amount of very merry people around the downtown area.
It was St. Patrick’s day and for some reason they celebrate it in a big way in Savannah with buildings light up in green, water in fountains dyed green, and pretty much everyone dressed up in bright green. There were hoards of people in and around all the bars and walking the streets, by the river, and in the main market area, and music blaring from various Irish Pubs. I did also see quite a few confused people in kilts and a guy on the bagpipes. I wandered around soaking in the atmosphere and taking a look at some of the southern architecture.
My final day, I drove into Okefenokee Swamp which had been recommended to me by various friends and hired a kayak for a couple of hours and kayaked my way around alligator infested swamps. It was really amazing – very quiet and still, and got the heart pumping especially the first few times that I saw an alligator up close and personal! There weren’t many people about and the stillness and the blackness of the water all added to atmosphere.
I did a short walk too around the area. The turtles were cool too! Then it was time to head onwards to Tampa. It didn’t take me as long as I was expecting, so I arrived at my friend Paul’s in time for sunset over Tampa Bay – beautiful!
Tampa
Just had a great weekend in Tampa with my friend Paul. It was great to see him again and get to meet his girlfriend. We had a lovely time catching up and I got to see a bit of Tampa, the Ybor district, the Aquarium, down to a lake with a airboat ride to see the ‘gators, and walk along the beach.
Now into my last week of my travels before getting to Ecuador and down to Miami and Key West...
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