JULY 4TH RIVERBOAT CRUISE

Before I arrived in Savannah, Mr. W and I had tossed around the idea of going on a riverboat cruise on the Savannah river to see the fireworks on July 4th.  On the drive down to Savannah, we decided to go ahead and book it.

River Street was one of the places I had been told to visit by several people. After seeing it on the city tour the day before, I knew this was a place that I wanted to come back and visit on my own because I was going to need more time to see everything I wanted to see. It is actually below street level, faces the river, and is full of shops, restaurants, bars and vendors.  It is where the old cotton exchange use to be and they have turned the old warehouses into shops and restaurants on the upper level or street level facing the street and even more below that face the river.  There are 2 parts to River Street.  One side is the shops and restaurants that has a sidewalk in order to walk easily by the shops. The other side is a river front plaza that is all concrete and has benches and a few permanent outdoor open shelters that are full of vendors.  An old cobblestone road runs down the middle.  It is original cobblestone and is very unlevel and hard to walk on.

When I had done the city tour the day before, the downtown area was not very crowded.  The tour guide even mentioned the fact that numbers were down from they expected.  There was a hurricane in the Atlantic that had been swirling around and so everyone felt that the uncertainty of where it was going to hit had kept people from the coast.  I was hoping that would be the case for watching fireworks on July 4th. Boy, was I wrong!

The riverboat cruise left at 9:00 pm.  They were going to start loading at 8:00 pm.  The cruise lasted for 90 minutes so we would be back at the dock around 10:30 pm.  Mr. W decided that we should get to River Street around 4:00.  He was concerned about finding parking and finding it in an area that we would feel safe to return to after 10:30.  There is very few parking areas on River Street.  In fact there are a few free spots on one end and 1 parking lot on the other end.  This part of River Street is about 10 city blocks long. We actually got the last spot in the parking lot. 

The decision had been made to walk through the shops, listen to the bands that were playing on the plaza, have dinner at one of the restaurants and then board the riverboat.  The later in the day, the more people on River Street.  People were coming early to claim their spot to watch the fireworks on the street.  They had set up blow ups for the kids along the plaza.  They had scheduled 3 bands to play on a stage that had been erected on the plaza.  Everywhere you turned, something was happening. We had hoped it would be a little cooler than it had been the day before.  There was a slight breeze down on the river so it was a little bit cooler.  However, the key word in that sentence is "little". :)

Soon it was time to start loading the riverboat.  People had started lining up to board before 7:00 AND they had been standing in the sun and heat. Not my idea of fun. So, around 7:45, we decided to get in line.  We boarded and since we wanted to be outside, we looked for a place to stand on the upper deck at the railing for the cruise.  After an encounter with a very drunk old man (he was much older than I am and mean so I'm calling him OLD), we found our spot along the railing.  The drunk guy is a whole story on its own.  However, I'm always dumbfounded as to why people get so wasted that they are obnoxious to so many people, it wasn't just to us, in such a large setting and then continue to drink.  He totally embarrassed his wife and did pass out before the cruise was over.  Sounds like a fun night for them, right? (She said very tongue in cheek.)

However, we did meet a group of young adults (late 20s/early 30s) from Columbia, SC.  They were a great group.  I told one of the couples that Daughter and family had just moved to Columbia and 3 of the couples began giving us all kinds of information to give to Daughter.  The conversation then moved to their personal lives.  One of the couples had just moved to Utah for work and had come back to visit so they could come as a group to Savannah to see the fireworks.  They had planned to go to one of the bars on River Street after the cruise to hear some acoustic guitar music.  I think if we had shown any interest in going, we would have been invited. 

The fireworks were great and we were really glad we went.  It turned out to be a really fun night. After we docked, we went back to one of the candy stores we had visited and bought some pralines and dark chocolate pecan clusters.  I'm sure those are on my healthy diet don't you? I mean, after all, nuts are protein and dark chocolate is an antioxidant.  See?  And, no one wants melted dark chocolate that has been carried around all afternoon! I'm sure the antioxidants would probably melt right off. So, we stopped by afterward. :)

What a great way to celebrate the birth of our great country.  No matter what our problems are, we still live in the best country in the whole world.  I so admire all the forefathers who had the vision and the courage to start a nation of freedom.  Happy birthday America!  This truly is the land of the free and the home of the brave.

River Street side of the old warehouses.  This area is below street level.  This is where most all the shops, restaurants, bars, vendors are.

This part goes under a hotel.  The mirrored sides you see are shops that you can enter that are part of the hotel.

Our boat for the cruise

There was a lot of boat traffic down the river early on.

This was a memorial of WWII casualties from this county.  The name of the memorial was "A World Apart".  This was on the plaza.

This was on the street level side of the warehouse.  They had these bridges built to get to the shops and restaurants.

These were the blow ups that they had there this weekend for the kids to enjoy.

One of the bands that were performing.  They had some great music by all of the bands.

The upper deck of our riverboat

Picture from that upper deck of the boat.  It was a wee bit crowded don't you think?

This is a shot looking down the other way.  That is a second boat that went out for the fireworks too.

Drum and fife going through the crowd on shore.

Sunset as we set sail

And the fireworks begin!

I really love the colors reflecting on the water.

Part of the big finale

Bridge that we cruised under on our way back to the dock.

We started second guessing ourselves that day as to whether this was going to be worth fighting the crowds, finding parking, the heat, etc., etc. (In our younger days, those things would have never crossed our mind.)  But, it really was worth it.  We had a great time.  We would do it again if we are back in Savannah on the 4th of July.  The cruise did sell out.  So, if you find yourself in Savannah on the 4th and want to do this, book at least 2 days before.  One interesting fact that I did not know, Savannah has the 2nd largest St. Patty's Day parade and celebration in the US.  Boston has the largest.  So, if you like to party on St. Patty's Day and can't make it to Boston, Savannah might be your place to be.