Month: December 2018

From St. Augustine, in the northeast corner of the state on the Atlantic coast, we headed southwest to the Tampa Bay area on the Gulf of Mexico.

Our first stop was at the celebrated new golf resort, Streamsong, in the middle of nowhere east of Tampa. It’s built on the same if-you-build-it-they-will-come concept as Bandon Dunes. Except for the clubhouse and lodge, which seem to have been designed by someone who likes the looks of minimum-security prisons, the place is beautiful and first-class in every way.

We had a delightful visit with Ginny’s aunt, Mary Vishney, who lives in the gulf coast town of Dunedin. She is vibrant, warm, wise and loving, and it’s no wonder that Ginny and her husband are crazy about her.

During this leg of the trip, Ginny and I were both able to re-connect with special friends.

Bob Best and I met 39(!) years ago when he worked for the Buccaneers and I was with the NFL.

Barry Mazer and I go back ever further – we sat next to each other in Miz Stutts’s second grade class at Crestline, and have been arguing about Alabama and Auburn football ever since (Best and I used to do the same thing about Alabama and Notre Dame, but there hasn’t been much room for debate in recent years).

En route to Naples, we stopped at Sanibel Island to have lunch with Ginny’s long-time work colleague, Bill Hotchkiss.

When we got to Naples, we got to visit with a lifelong friend of Ginny’s father, Tom Lofgran.

Naples is a short hop down the gulf coast from Tampa. Speaking of which, when we arrived there, the weather was warm enough for us to wear shorts for the first time since Labor Day weekend (there’s no sense in showing a picture confirming that, since my legs would be indistinguishable from the white background on this page)!

We had dinner and played golf with Karen and Dan Bennewitz and got to spend an evening with some other Weston pals, Rick and Lori Allen, Barb Seymour and Kathy Meighan.

Golf at Royal Poiciana with Karen and Dan also involved playing through a foursome of iguanas and birds.

From Naples, we kept heading south until there was no more south to go.

We drove through the edge of the Everglades and picked up Greg at the Ft. Lauderdale airport (what a trooper – after spending a week taking finals at WSU, he celebrated by getting on a red-eye!), then headed to Key West, the southernmost place in the continental U.S.

Happily, the 150-mile drive from Miami was not stressful. U.S. Highway 1, a.k.a. The Overseas Highway, used to be narrow and lethal (it was originally built on top of an old railroad bridge), but most of the road and its 42 bridges have been replaced in recent years. Now it’s as scenic as any drive we’ve had on the entire trip, and not just because RV drivers find special beauty in roads with wide shoulders. The road traverses more than 30 keys, starting with Key Largo just south of Homestead, FL, en route to Key West.

Key West is a combo of New Orleans, Vegas and Disney World. It has an historic, old-town feel, it’s full of street vendors, bars, restaurants, live music, kitschy shops, roosters (they’re everywhere) and quirky characters, plus there are plenty of sites and activities to check out. Fun fact: Key West was one of the five largest cities in Florida as recently as the 1930s (when Florida was the least-populated state in the South) – now it’s #142.

Our busiest day included both jet-skiing and a sunset cruise. Otherwise, we enjoyed plenty of local seafood, rum-based hydration and sightseeing.

On the sailboat, Ginny and I reprised our favorite wedding photo for our 7th anniversary two days later!

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From Key West, it was back to the Miami area to put Greg on a plane to Connecticut, see our dear friends the O’Connors and get ready for Christmas with the Rosensweigs!

One of our better pieces of trip-planning was getting to enjoy, back-to-back, two of the most scenic and historic old cities in the nation.

After Charleston and my dogleg to Atlanta, Ginny and I met back up in Savannah, GA.  It was settled in 1733 by James Oglethorpe as the first city in the colony of Georgia, located at the mouth of the Savannah River.  It was the southernmost commercial port in the 13 colonies and was an important trade and shipping hub for the cotton industry in the early 19th century and during the Confederacy.  Fortunately, at the end of Sherman’s march through Georgia, the General spared the city from the fate of pretty much everything else in his path during his Union army’s march to the sea from Atlanta.  As a result, one of the most beautiful and unique cities in the nation was preserved.  

Oglethorpe laid out Savannah in a series of small town squares, a configuration now enjoying a renaissance among modern urban planners. The original squares and their surrounding buildings (most of which are antebellum in vintage and are now restored) are the soul of the city.  They comprise one of the largest National Historic Landmark Districts in the nation.

Tourism is now Savannah’s biggest economic driver.  The place is loaded with great restaurants and has a thriving arts scene.  Many of the old houses are now owned by beautiful people.  This is because Georgia has become the largest state in the U.S. for production of feature films (thank you, tax incentives!).  As only one example, we saw the town square where the bus stop scenes in Forrest Gump were filmed.

From historic Savannah, we drove south to even more historic St. Augustine, FL, which is the oldest continuously inhabited European-established settlement in the U.S.

St. Augustine was founded in 1565 and was the capital of Spanish Florida for over 200 years.  After Spain ceded Florida to the U.S. in 1819, it became the first capital of the Florida Territory.  

After the Civil War, Henry Flagler, Standard Oil’s co-founder and then the real estate speculator who created modern Florida, tried to revitalize St. Augustine by making it a winter resort.  However, two other Flagler-developed cities located farther south in Florida, Palm Beach and Miami, eclipsed St. Augustine due to their warmer winter weather.  

Today, St. Augustine is a relatively small city of fewer than 15,000 people.  Starting in 1965, at time of the celebration of its 400th anniversary, St. Augustine began revitalizing its inner city by reconstructing a number of buildings to their original appearance.  The historic district retains its narrow streets and historic aesthetics.  

The signature structure in town, however, remains the Castillo de San Marcos.  This fort was built by the Spanish over 300 years ago and remains the oldest masonry structure in the continental U.S.  

For us, it wasn’t all sightseeing, history and merriment, however.  Our campground was right on the Atlantic Ocean – lots of beach walks and sunsets.     

From St. Augustine, it was off to central and south Florida, where friends and family awaited!

By Jim.

Atlanta was always going to be on our trip itinerary, because it’s the site of the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library & Museum (the seventh official Presidential Library of the trip, with six to go).  Then we got lucky when we could time that leg of the trip for the same weekend that Alabama and Georgia were in town to play in the SEC Championship Game.  Ginny decided to stay in Charleston to spend some extra time with Coley, so one of my best friends from law school, Woody Sanderson, was able to juggle his work schedule (it wouldn’t be fair to let loose a retirement zinger right now) and join me.

The Carter Library and Museum also includes the Carter Center, which is dedicated to providing facilities and services to resolve conflicts, advance democracy and human rights, prevent diseases and improve mental health care.

The Carter Center sets this one apart from all other Presidential Libraries, and exemplifies why Jimmy Carter is America’s greatest ex-President.

The buildings housing the Museum, Library and Center are unpretentious and understated, just like President Carter.  

The Library’s exhibits on the Carter Administration caused me a nearly-overwhelming sense of nostalgia and sadness. I passionately supported Carter’s out-of-nowhere run to the White House in 1976, which I mostly experienced in Alabama, having moved there that summer to start law school after living in California and Oregon for 12 years. Carter personified what was then called The New South – the success of racial desegregation made the region seem receptive to other forms of progressivism. Reagan’s defeat of Carter in 1980 snuffed out that spirit, with ramifications that went beyond the South. For example, one of Reagan’s first acts as President was to remove the solar panels Carter had installed at the White House.

Jimmy Carter’s life story is the American dream come true.    Born in a small town in rural Georgia, he served his country by going to the Naval Academy, then earning an assignment to Admiral Hyman Rickover’s elite nuclear submarine program.  However, Carter’s sense of family was stronger than his ambition.  When his father died, young Lieutenant Carter resigned his commission to return to Plains, GA and rescue his family’s farming business.  A few years later, he entered politics, first as a state senator and then as Governor of Georgia.  After one term in the statehouse, he ran for President, prompting a story in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution headlined, “Jimmy Carter Is Running for WHAT?”

President Carter started the tradition of newly-inaugurated Presidents walking from Capitol Hill down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House after taking the oath of office.  January 20, 1977 was an exhilarating day, filled with hope and goodwill.  But Carter inherited a lousy economy (remember Gerald Ford’s “Whip Inflation Now” buttons?) and an even worse national mood (the aftermath of Vietnam and Watergate).  He still achieved important legislative victories, such as creating the Department of Energy, establishing the environmental Super Fund and deregulating the transportation, media and banking industries.  His greatest triumphs were as a diplomat – the SALT II arms limitations agreement, the treaty implementing our decades-old commitment to return control of the Panama Canal to Panama and, most importantly, the Camp David Accords and the Israeli-Egyptian Peace Treaty.

Ultimately, the Carter Presidency was doomed by the Iran hostage crisis, which lasted 444 days, including the entire year of 1980 when Carter was running for reelection.  Carter got the blame for a long-shot military rescue operation that failed in April, 1980, but not nearly enough credit for his gritty, patient diplomacy and tough, pragmatic seizure of billions of dollars of Iranian assets that punished Iran’s outrageous behavior and created negotiating leverage.  His tireless efforts culminated in the return of the hostages – with no loss of life – on the day Reagan, his successor, was inaugurated.  In recognition of Carter’s achievement, Reagan asked him to travel to Germany to greet the hostages on their return to freedom.

In the 37 years since he left office, Jimmy Carter has devoted his life to humanitarian causes worldwide.  He has overseen elections in foreign countries.  He has brokered peace accords.  He has written 31 books.  Rosalyn has advocated tirelessly for the mentally ill.  As a couple, they have been the faces of Habitat For Humanity and raised funds and awareness for public health initiatives – one of which is the distribution by the Carter Center of a drug preventing onchocerciasis, also known as river blindness, a triumph commemorated by a statue of the grounds of the Museum.

Jimmy and Rosalyn both received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1991.  President Carter was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001.  He even won Grammy Awards for narrations of his audiobooks.  These achievements are displayed at the Museum and should make every citizen proud of how our country has been served by this honorable man and the splendid wife who has been at his side during 72 years of marriage.

I regard it as a supreme irony that the two U.S. Presidents whose hands I’ve shaken are Jimmy Carter and Donald Trump – polar opposites in morality and character.

After my time at the Library, I headed into nearby downtown Atlanta and started counting down to kickoff for the SEC Championship Game being played the following day at Mercedes Benz Stadium, Atlanta’s new $1.6 billion sporting pleasure palace.

I rode a Ferris wheel that provided an interesting perspective on Centennial Park (of 1996 Olympics fame) and not much else…

and walked over to the remarkable stadium. 

After meeting up with Woody and having a nice dinner in town, we went back to The Big T, which was parked on Stonewall Jackson Drive, near Robert E. Lee Blvd. at Stone Mountain State Park in Stone Mountain, GA.  The New South hasn’t fully taken root yet, even in Atlanta.  

Championship GameDay was rainy and tense.  After a noon-time get-together with our classmate and good friend Scott Phelps, Woody and I got to the stadium well before kickoff.  As luck would have it, recently-elected Alabama Senator Doug Jones was sitting three rows behind us.  He agreed to a picture and was as gracious  and classy as could be.  

The game was epic.  For Alabama fans, the mood swings included (in order) confidence, surprise, shock, disbelief, terror, hope and redemption.

The storyline of Jalen Hurts was too implausible for a Hollywood script.  He lost his job as Alabama quarterback on this same field against this same team in last year’s National Championship game; then he came off the bench Saturday in the 4th quarter when his replacement, Tua Tagovailoa, got injured; he passed for the tying touchdown and ran for the winning score with one minute left in the game.  It’s why sports is the greatest form of entertainment – reality can be more amazing than fantasy.  

By the end of the game, all the Bama fans around us had become our new best friends.  We’d shared a lot in four hours, and there were multiple high-fives and hugs when it was over.  College football at its best.  

Roll Tide!

 

When we planned our trip, Thanksgiving in Charleston, SC was one of the must-do tentpoles we planted, along with Mount Rushmore for Fourth of July, New England in October and Florida in December.

Charleston is one of America’s great cities…size doesn’t matter.

It was one of the ten largest cities in the U.S. as late as the 1840s.  Today, it’s population is “only” about 135,000, yet it remains one of the coolest, classiest and friendliest cities in the country…and beyond.  In 2016, it was named the Best City In The World by Travel + Leisure.  It’s full of great restaurants, classic architecture, nice people and lots of water (not all of it under control – there are these tides that work mischief all over the place, including the city streets…).

Be all that as it may, the main reason for spending so much time in Charleston is that our daughter, Coley Kaeser, had the good sense to move there a few years ago.

During our drive down from Myrtle Beach, we knew we weren’t just in the South, we were now in the Deep South, when we drove past some cotton fields!

And as we arrived at Coley’s house, we were reminded we were in the city where the Civil War started…

We arrived on the Sunday before Thanksgiving and had a big adjustment to make – we stayed at Coley’s house instead of on The Big T.  It was nice for us, and pure joy for Sting and Roxy, who had a fenced backyard to romp in (not to mention a playmate, Coley’s dog Hunter).  Roxy also spent much of the week obsessing over the squirrels in the trees in the backyard.

We had big plans for sightseeing in the historic downtown area of Charleston (more sightseeing than we’ve already done, actually, since we’ve been here before), but we ended up spending a lot of time being semi-slugs, because it was so nice to lounge around a real house.

Thanksgiving dinner was at Dap’s, the downtown restaurant where Coley works (her smile is one of Dap’s most important assets!).  The owners closed the place and threw a big dinner for the staff and their families and friends.  We felt sorta old, but had a blast.  

A few days later, Ginny and I got to play a special golf course, the Country Club of Charleston (site of the 2019 U.S. Women’s Open)…

and I also played a notoriously hard course, the Ocean Course on Kiawah Island (site of the 1991 Ryder Cup and the 2012 and 2021 PGA Championships).  

Both courses were challenging, and picturesque, and the fact that CCofC was way more fun to play than the Ocean Course was partly due to the 25 mph winds and 50-degree temperature at Kiawah the day I was there!

Charleston is a foodie paradise.  We had a couple of epic meals, including at R Kitchen, which has a different menu every night (and you eat what’s put before you – the kitchen, not you, decides what gets served)…

…and Magnolia’s, a local classic.  There are also wine bars, whiskey bars, brewpubs…every culinary vice imaginable.

We got to see both family and friends during our stay.  We had a nice visit and dinner with Ginny’s brother, Mike Dysart, his wife Lauri and their daughter and son-in-law, Ann and George Schneidmuller (Ginny also got some bonus time with Mike and Lauri the following week).  We also had a great evening with our old Weston pals, Scott Willard and Marilyn Reap, who recently moved to the area.

Charleston is so special, it was with some reluctance that I left on the Wednesday after Thanksgiving, to go to Atlanta to attend the SEC Championship Game and hang out with my classmate and good bud, Woody Sanderson.  Ginny stayed in Charleston through the weekend, and we planned to re-unite in Savannah the day after the game, for a couple of days in the city that’s described as a mini-Charleston, before we head to Florida.