We did the 10K Saturday, “The South’s Toughest Bridge Run.” Here’s that bridge, the unfortunately named Talmadge Memorial Bridge. That’s 185 feet of vertical navigational clearance for ships, and a horizontal clearance is 1,023 feet. The total length is 1.9 miles, so the over-and-back was 3.8 miles or 6.2 kilometers, of the run. This is the most imposing view on foot.
The view up top is pretty grand. Looking to the east, the Atlantic Ocean is about 15 miles downstream.
And if you look upriver to the west, the shipping port goes farther than your eye can see. This is, after all, the largest single ocean container terminal on the U.S. eastern seaboard, and the nation’s fourth-busiest seaport. Odds are some of your Christmas presents slipped through these waters.
Here’s a nice casual view of the cable stays. The shots we take mid-jog:
The run goes over to Hutchinson Island, which is in the river, but still in Georgia. (One year I’ll just go all the way over the line into South Carolina.) It’s an industrial, convention, resort-based island, but there is a struggling residential project underway, The Reserve at Savannah Harbor. Everything down here is turning into a neighborhood or a shopping district.
If you lived out on “The Reserve” — they should rethink that name — and drove into Savannah for work, you’d look down off the bridge and see the signs of a booming industry.
There are acres and acres of heavy industry, waiting to be deployed and put into service.
I ran this 10K at almost an identical time to last year’s 10K. Next year, the goal is to get to the bridge run while not recovering from a surgery — anybody’s surgery, and any surgery.
After a hearty lunch we spent the afternoon at Forsyth Park. This was my view.
We are familiar with this spot. This is the spot The Yankee and I picked to spend an afternoon on our first visit to Savannah, almost 17 years ago, in April 2005. This, then, is our tree.
Click the above image to embiggen.
This is also the spot where we got engaged 14 years ago, in December of 2008.
I sit on her left, and if I look further to the left, this is the view.
Nice and peaceful.
We got married at the Mansion on Forsyth, in June of 2009. Some of our pictures were taken right here.
At the center of Forsyth Park — which has tennis and basketball courts, is the home of the local rugby squad and also boasts a great playground and fragrant garden, but was upon a time the drilling grounds for the local militia and guard, including the legendary Georgia Hussars paraded here — you’ll find the fountain.
Installed in 1858, the fountain was manufactured by a Bronx foundry. I did not know about that New York connection until just now. In fact, that foundry also produced work for the dome of the U.S. Capitol building, and railings on the Brooklyn Bridge. Small world, metallurgically speaking.
On Saturday evening we went out to The Crab Shack. We dined under the oak trees.
We ate delicious crab.
And now I want more delicious crab.
Tomorrow … we’ll continue to play catchup. More stuff from a Sunday and Monday in Savannah.
