I took a trip to the land of magnolias, in the deep South.

They were in bloom everywhere and looking gorgeous.

 

This statue is of James Oglethorpe, founder of Georgia.   He sounds like he was a rather nice sort of person, he was an MP, was an English prison reformer, friend of the Indians, opponent of slavery, and a founding member of the British Museum among other accomplishments.

The town sits along the Savannah River, and there are ancient locks that bypass the rocky shoals so that they could ship out the cotton and sugar.

 

You know that you are in the south when you see Spanish moss hanging from the trees.

 

Because the town was not burned in the American Civil War (unlike Atlanta), there are lots of beautiful buildings still standing, like this one which was the Cotton Exchange (place where cotton was bought and sold).

 

The gorgeous old sugar mill is a fine example of a Victorian factory. (Quite possibly Satanic to work in, but rather lovely on the outside.)

 

And because it’s the South there is the mandatory monument to the Confederate War dead.   It has the generals where they are easy to see, the enlisted man is high up at the top.