As I mentioned in my last post, my husband picked me up in Philadelphia after driving by himself from Maine and we ended up spending the night in Baltimore. We checked into the Hilton Garden Inn in downtown Baltimore which we found to be quite convenient in terms of it's location ( given the opportunity try to get room 830 - it has a unique feature)
The city itself is easily walkable, and centers around the fact that is mostly on the waterfront. Seems to be populated by young, energetic people interested in exercise, fashion and great food. On the subject of food, I also previously mentioned Miss Shirley's, which exceeded my expectations (something even the most highly recommended restaurants rarely do)
The next day we headed to Richmond, Virginia, where we spent the majority of our time speaking to college coaches and taking a close look at the University of Richmond for both of our sons ( a truly beautiful college).
That evening we unfortunately could not get a hotel within walking distance (95 degrees shortens most anyone's "walking distance") of the most interesting area in Richmond. Nevertheless, we did find what was rumored to be a rather good Italian restaurant somewhat close to our hotel. My husband and I arrived - he, drenched in sweat and I somewhat warm - at Mamma Zu. Quickly we realized why we were told to arrive early. It's a small restaurant and it was packed... Standing at the bar he quickly downed a cold beer while I nursed a glass of chardonnay. It was a this point that a strange man who was cleaning the tables asked our name and we were told the wait would be from 20 to 30 minutes. Please understand, my husband waits for nothing; however, I could tell he liked it when he decided to order a bottle of wine, make a space for me under the air conditioning vent, and proceeded to get both of us drunk before dinner even started. To make a long story short, we eventually got our table, the food was great and we experienced something that most likely would never happen again: my husband took his license and his visa card in order to travel light, I took nothing...but they only took Amex!!! Much to our surprise, though, the man who originally we believed was the bus boy turned out to be the owner and he said: "just mail me a check when you get home."
After going to an ATM, getting cash and returning to pay the bill (my husband is a gringo) we got back to the hotel, woke up the next morning and continued on to Savannah.
I thought Savannah was mostly plantations like "Gone with the Wind". As it turned out I was as delighted with Savannah as I was with Baltimore. Everyone is surprisingly friendly ( my husband explained the concept of southern hospitality), the architecture is beautiful, music can be heard literaly everywhere, and I am very much looking forward to returning (so much so that I now plan on making a second attempt to read the book "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil". ) On a side note, should you go make sure to take a walk down the river, have a slice of pizza in Vinny Van Go Gos and request room 326 at the Hilton Garden Inn (another great feature we put to good use).
From here, we headed back to Miami and although both of us are going back to work we do so with smiles on our faces and fond memories of a great summer.
