Return to Savannah, Ga., Part I

Last week, with winter -- and Lee Ann's birthday -- fast approaching, we figured it was a good time to squeeze in a short getaway to one of our favorite places, Savannah, Ga.

We'd been to Savannah only once -- and it was just nine months ago -- but that one time left a deep impression on us. We had crammed a lot of sight-seeing into four days in March, and we were itching to go back and spend more time along the riverfront. Best of all, our vacation club site in Savannah had a couple nights available last week, so we grabbed them and took off on Wednesday.

The weather was cool that day, but it warmed up on Thursday, which would be the only full day we'd have this time. And instead of exploring more of the riverfront, we went back to the neighborhood squares that we so much enjoyed in March. It was like those magnificent moss-draped oaks called us back, and we listened.

It was highlighted by the dramatic north entry to Forsyth Square, the largest of the neighborhood parks that Savannah is known for. The photo leading off the post is what you see as you begin the trek into the park from that end.

We were hoping to reprise a visit with two elderly gentleman who we had met sitting on a bench on the south end of Forsyth in March. I seemed to recall them telling us they were in the park frequently, and Lee Ann remembered them saying they lived in a development along the eastside of the park. If you follow this blog regularly, you might remember them from the photo that lead off this post. I was hoping to photograph them again.

Unfortunately, the gentlemen were not there. So we moved on.

While in Wright Square last week, I composed a photo of a huge oak whose branches and moss draped over a boulder commemorating Tomochichi, a leader of the Yamacraw Indian tribe. In the 17th century, Tomochichi befriended the British colonists and helped Gen. James Oglethorpe negotiate acquisition of the land that would become Savannah. That photo appears above.

Johnson Square, one of the original squares of the city, I composed the photo below looking north toward city hall. Not far behind city hall is the dramatic cliff drop to the riverfront where we had hoped to spend more time. If the bottom crop of this image seems a bit curious, it's because the backside of a distracting (to me, anyway) park monument that filled the middle bottom portion of the original frame. I tried composing this on the other side of the monument, but I lose content I wanted to include -- a few of trees in the line on the right that you see here along Bull Street. Hence, the decision to keep this version and apply the crop.

Above: A moss-covered oak adding a powerful artistic element to the entrance of one of the Savannah College of Art and Design buildings.

Above: I don't know what was in this shop not far from St. John the Baptist Cathedral, but when I saw the tribute to Mississippi John Hurt outside the shop, I had to grab this photo. I came across Hurt's folksy blues while listening to a Milwaukee album-oriented rock radio station in the 1970s. I still turn to his music from time to time when I'm wanting to relax ... and smile.

Congregation Mickve Israel is one of the oldest Jewish congregations in the United States. It dates to 1735. I photographed this structure in March, but I don't think I had this nice of a view that I got last week. 

Above: This is a very dramatic crop of a photo I took with the Tamron lens at maximum focal length (300mm). 

Above and below: In another of the squares, I came across this gentleman performing in holiday-colored garb ... and attraction the attention of a little boy who was with what I presumed was his mother. I was quite a distance away, limiting my composition oppositions. Fortunately, I was using my Tamron 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 zoom lens, and I'm pretty sure I had the zoom all the way at the long end for these shots.

A secondary reason to visit Savannah was to appreciate how the city dressed up for the holidays, so the photos above and what follow are things I came across that help illustrate that objective.

As always, to view a larger, sharper version of a photo, simply click on the image. To see a full gallery of my recent shoots in Savannah, click on the link in this sentence.

Photo geek stuff: I used my Canon 6D and Tamron 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Di PZD VC lens for all of the exterior shots, each bracketed for three exposures and processed in Photomatix high-dynamic range (HDR) software.

Next up: Shots taken during my recent trip to Savannah using my new iPhone X