Road Trip

I’ve been feeling slightly "postal" these days so I am getting away from here for a little while. I’m heading to my beloved North Carolina. I’ll be visiting with my good friends Emma and David in Chapel Hill for a couple days. We will have great fun.


I’m certain the paparazzi will hunt Emma and myself down like before!

Heading Home

Well I am heading home this morning and not a moment too soon. This place drives me CRAZY! It's always nice to visit with my mum and I always like to come back to Fort Myers to reconfirm the knowledge this town lacks soul.

I met a couple of Interior Decorators while visiting. They are going to make some drapery for my mothers bedroom. We hit it off rather well and they think I should relocate here because they believe I would be busy all the time. I know this would probably be true because people are moving here constantly and have money to burn, but I did not have the heart to tell them I don't really care for Fort Myers and Florida in general.

The cats had a good time. They enjoy having a full house to run around in and they definitely enjoy going out on the lanai. This morning a giant herrin flew down right in front of them which naturally sent them into a tizzy. Then a rabbit came by to torment them and just stared while it grazed.

Well I guess it's time to get the car loaded and head home to civilisation. ;) Hopefully the 8 hour drive will go by quickly and uneventfully. On the way here a stone flew up from the road and cracked my windscreen. I'm still pissed off about it.

Fort Myers

I spent today walking around downtown and if I dare mention, I visited a Star Bucks Coffee House. I really don’t like corporate coffee, but there isn’t anything else here. Downtown has been cleaned up quite a bit from the way it used to be. Unfortunately there isn’t much to do. It’s mostly made up of restaurants and bars and shopping is limited.

At one time it was full of antique shops, but they are all gone. You used to find all kinds of kitsch things. The city planners ran them all out because they wanted to revitalize the area and in doing so the rents went way up. It’s really quite a shame.

It seems the people here prefer to frequent malls and strip malls, which is evident from the suburban sprawl. The downtown area is completely dead because of it. It’s odd to me because in Savannah the downtown or historic district is the place to be.

Of course Savannah has its architecture, history and an art school which breaths life into the city. Fort Myers doesn’t have a creative scene. I believe that plays a big part in its lifelessness.

Downtown Fort Myers has the potential, but they have not discovered it as of yet so there are empty buildings everywhere with For Lease signs.

Below are some photographs I took today. Most of them are in sepia tone. Enjoy!

Friday

On Friday “N” and I went to Charleston. He invited me to go along on one of his classes’ field trip. They had to tour Fort Moultrie and its batteries on Sullivan’s Island. Unfortunately both of us got sunburned for not wearing any protection. It's amazing how the sun can wipe you out.

Afterwards we had lunch at Poe’s Tavern. Edgar Allan Poe was stationed at Fort Moultrie so his name is passed around on public buildings and businesses. It’s rather like Ethan Allen in New England.

We walked around a little and then met with many of his friends. They were all very nice and a lot of fun. I could tell they all missed him and it’s easy to see why. He makes everyone laugh.

One of his friends made arrangements for all of us to have dinner at Vickery’s. We met everyone there after they got off work. The food was good and the company was great. Afterwards we headed down to market and went to a wine bar. It was kind of crazy in the market area because it was the first night of Spoleto and the wine bar was too loud.

Since we ended up staying late into the evening we didn’t get back to Savannah until around 3:00 AM. However I had a good time and ate some wonderful food and drank some really good wine and met some nice people. It was a nice break from the routine.



Here architectural history students look down a large hole.


Here we are exploring the Pit of Hell. Actually it is inside one of the batteries owned by a fire company. They use it for test burns. The professor dragged us all inside as an endurance test. I kind of liked it, It was dark and dank and reminded me of a tomb.


Here we are being lead down the Steps of Doom. It was a damaged staircase hidden by over growth upon the Temple of Doom. Okay, actually it was battery dating to about 1898.


The structure off in the distance is none other then Fort Sumter, the very spot where the War of Southern Independence began and the War Between the States started.