Joshua Tree, Las Vegas, and the Deep South

We left San Diego and went to Joshua Tree National Park for the first time. We took a hike out to 49 Palms Oasis. It was cold and clear.



Later we learned that the oasis was on top of a fault line where uplifted layers of impermeable rock trap groundwater. Fan palms can grow to be over 75 feet tall, live up to 90 years, and weigh almost 3 tons.



We rented a house located in the Wonder Valley just north of Joshua Tree for a meditation self-retreat.



During our month in the desert we experienced a variety of weather events and a wide range of temperatures. We were surprised how beautiful the desert was.



The house we rented was named Back-Of-Beyond and it was on a dirt road about half an hour from the closest town of Twentynine Palms. The fence around it gave us lots of privacy and helped keep sand from blowing around in the yard.



We saw some spectacular sunrises.



And some great sunsets, too.

During the January super moon Pete took this photo as the moon was rising.



This is the super moon setting 12 hours later on the other side of the house.



After our month of silent meditation practice, we took a hike in Joshua Tree National Park. This photo was taken near the summit of Ryan Mountain.



There was plenty of cholla cactus, which looked lit up when the sun was behind the spines.



From the top of Ryan Mountain we had 360 degree views of the surrounding area.



We drove through the national park, enjoying all the Joshua trees. (In case you’re wondering, the vandalism done during the year end government shutdown was not visible to us.)



We drove to Las Vegas to spend a couple days with Pete’s mom Csilla and his sister Denise. We went to the Bellagio to check out their Chinese New Year display.



The Chinese figure’s clothing was made of live flowers and we could see the irrigation water dripping off.



2019 is the year of the pig.



It took a few tries but we finally got all four of us in a selfie, or rather a groupie.



We went to the Venetian for lunch. They also had decorations for Chinese New Year. The pigs at the Venetian were cuter, so we took more photos there.

We came to Las Vegas to pick up Csilla so we could travel together in the Deep South. This would be our fourth trip together, having been to Boston in 2014, and Los Angeles and Denver in 2015. The three of us flew to Atlanta. When we landed we immediately left Atlanta to avoid the Super Bowl madness. We drove to Augusta, Georgia. The next morning we went to the Riverwalk along the Savannah River. 

The very first blossoms of spring were emerging.



Sunday in downtown Augusta was very quiet. We spotted this sign and remembered that James Brown, the Godfather of Soul, was from Augusta.



At the Augusta Museum of History we enjoyed their James Brown exhibit, which included his outfits, music and dancing videos plus interesting photographs like this one with the Reverend Al Sharpton.



It seemed appropriate that the James Brown statue in Augusta had him dressed in a floor length cape.



The next day we went to the Sacred Heart Cultural Center, formerly a catholic church.





These days Sacred Heart hosts many weddings in the Great Hall.



En route to Charleston we visited the Magnolia Plantation & Gardens (MP&G) and took the Nature Train to see the grounds. It was beautiful weather and it was fun to see nesting Great Blue Herons around the ponds.



It was our first time to see Spanish moss, which is neither Spanish nor a moss, but an epiphyte in the tilandsia family. We thought its ghostly gray color looked even better in person than in photos.



MP&G has been a tourist destination for over 150 years and we enjoyed strolling in their Romantic Gardens and seeing the blooming camelias.



We walked over this bridge, then continued on by car into the city of Charleston, South Carolina.



We were excited to explore Charleston so we walked a bit to take in the sights. There were so many beautifully preserved historical buildings, like these houses on Rainbow Row that were built between 1740 and 1790.



Charleston’s history of slavery was first seen in the “MART” building, which was both an auction house and prison for enslaved people.



We toured the restored eponymous Nathanial Russell House Museum. The house was built over a five-year period and completed in 1808.



From the Historic Charleston Foundation pamphlet we read, “The house cost $80,000 to build, at a time when the average value of a home was $262.” Everything about the house was grandiose, to demonstrate the wealth of the owner.



“The home’s graceful, free-flying, three-story staircase is an architectural marvel with each cantilevered step supporting the one above and below it.”





On the tour we learned that Russell’s wealth came from owning and selling enslaved people. This wasn’t a complete surprise, but it was shocking to see so much material wealth that had been gained in such an immoral way being flaunted.



Next we toured the Heyward-Washington House, which you can see is a three-story brick house. It was owned by Thomas Heyward, Jr.  during the late 18th century. Washington was added to the name added when the first US President stayed there during his Southern tour. But we were most intrigued to learn about later residents, two sisters named Sarah and Angelina Grimké who lived there at the turn of the 19th century.



The Grimké sisters grew up witnessing their mother beating the enslaved people working as domestics in the house, and this led them to become fierce abolitionists. Sarah and Angelina Grimké decided to leave Charleston and move to Philadelphia. They became Quakers and also advocates for women’s rights. The house had been restored to show what the Grimkés’ parlor looked like when they lived there.



Away from the main house was the kitchen, separated by Charleston law to prevent fires. This is where the enslaved people would have prepared the meals.



We took Csilla to Rodney Scott’s Barbecue Restaurant so she could try South Carolina-style barbecue, which is traditionally made with pork.



We are trying to eat vegetarian these days, so we opted for baked beans, coleslaw and collard greens. We tasted the barbecue sauce that was thin with lots of black pepper.



Next we visited the preserved Aiken-Rhett House Museum. Here we learned an important distinction between restoration and preservation. The Aiken-Rhett house was preserved, meaning we could see what was left of the actual original wallpaper still on the walls.



The house and its surviving furnishings were quite a contrast to the restored mansions we toured.



Csilla liked all the Charleston houses we toured because she learned a lot about the history through visiting them. She was impressed with the efforts to save so many homes here and felt the city was beautiful as a result.





Another Charleston favorite of Csilla’s was the pineapple fountain in the Waterfront Park. 

She taught us that the pineapple is an international symbol of hospitality.



The next day we drove back into Georgia to visit Savannah. En route we went to the Savannah Wildlife Refuge and drove their four mile road through the wetlands. There was lots of Spanish moss in the live oak trees here too.



We saw 16 different types of birds, including this Anhinga.



We saw at least seven American alligators. We met a ranger there and he said he counts the number of feet of alligators he sees each day and he was already at 150 feet.



This Little Blue Heron was taking off as Pete snapped this photo, creating an interesting image.



We rented a new Airbnb house and were thrilled to stay there for three nights.



We cooked a lot in the kitchen. Here Kristina is packing a picnic lunch.



We set off to explore historic Savannah. This 1899 building is aptly named The Gingerbread House.



Savannah was originally laid out around 21 small squares that today are beautiful little parks. Pete and Csilla are in the Monterey Square.



There’s plenty of Spanish moss in Savannah too. When the sunlight catches it, it’s especially striking.



On this trip we read Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, which was recommended by our friends Mya, Paul and Julie. Written by John Berendt (whose City of Falling Angels book we had devoured while visiting Venice) it's a blend of fact and fiction and through reading it we learned a lot about Savannah in the 1980s. We were curious to visit the Mercer Mansion where much of the story takes place.



Interestingly the Mercer house was commissioned by the great great grandfather of Johnny Mercer, but the Civil War interrupted construction and resulted in no Mercer ever living in the house. In 1969 Jim Williams bought and began restoring the mansion, including the dome with spectacular stained glass over the main spiral staircase.



Jim Williams was a self-made antiques dealer and he used the carriage house as his antiques shop.



Csilla loved the Mercer house architecture and was impressed with the antique furniture, such as this wall clock that took two years to be repaired in Switzerland.



Csilla was impressed with the design of Savannah, with its 21 squares. At night the big windows in the houses around the squares were lit up and reminded her of an advent calendar.



We also toured the Davenport House Museum that was built in 1820. It was bought in 1955 and restored by the Historic Savannah Foundation, which is credited with saving hundreds of historic buildings in Savannah.

This close up of the wall paper shows how it has movement like curtains. The framed silhouette was one of three original artworks recovered and is believed to be Sarah Clark Davenport. She became a widow very young so she converted it into a boarding house that she ran for 23 years.



We were able to check out all three stories of the house.



We went to the birthplace of Juliette Gordon Low, who founded the Girl Scouts of America. Kristina, who likes to be prepared, is flashing her Girl Scout salute.



The Owens-Thomas house and slave quarters had been restored by the Telfair Museums group. This is the exterior of the main house.



Telfair has done an incredible job of researching the history of the 600 enslaved people owned by the Richardsons (the original owners of the house who also owned cotton plantations). On one wall the known names were displayed, with blank wood representing a person whose name was not known.



Between nine and 15 enslaved people, about half of whom were children, lived and worked at the Owens-Thomas house starting in 1819. This is where most of them would have slept.



The ceiling of the slave quarters was still painted with its original haint blue. Haint refers to ghosts, and the blue color represents water which the spirits aren't able to cross, so haint blue was thought to protect people from evil spirits.



We found the only vegan restaurant in Savannah named the Fox and the Fig, and Csilla treated us to dinner.



Kristina loved the sweet potato tacos.

We liked it so much we went back for lunch. This is the Plank, which includes (from left) pickled vegetables, hummus, miso-glazed seitan, toast, mixed nuts, fruits and three types of surprisingly good cashew cheeses: truffle, sun dried tomato and cheddar.

Pete ordered his first Beyond Burger. He thought it was really good and found its texture to be just like a beef burger.

The company Beyond Meat has been working on the recipe for seven years, and uses beets to get the patty its red color.

We walked around Forsyth Park and checked out the Forsyth Fountain. We learned it's not a custom design and that there are others including one we had seen in Cusco, Peru.



It was a treat to be in the South while the magnolias were starting to bloom.



The flowers smell so good.

This is the back of the Confederate Monument in Forsyth Park, which was erected in the spring of 1879, making it the probably oldest of these kinds of monuments to white supremacy. Savannah plans to rename the Civil War Memorial and add a plaque that will read: "This memorial was originally erected in 1875 to the Confederate dead, redesigned in 1879, and rededicated in 2018 to all the dead of the American Civil War."



We spent a morning strolling in the Bonaventure Cemetery. There we saw plenty of Southern Crosses of Honor marking graves of Confederate soldiers. Later we learned that the United Daughters of the Confederacy gave them out to honor Confederate Veterans but that the practice only started in 1900, well into the Jim Crow era.



This monument that Pete and Csilla are looking at has a large southern cross on the top.

Johnny Mercer and his family are also buried at Bonaventure. This is his mother's grave and has the engraving, "my mama done tol' me".

Hmmn, would Spanish Moss be suitable for a wig?

We took a riverboat cruise on the Savannah River. The Georgia Queen looks like an 1800s paddle wheel boat but was actually built in 1995.

From the river we got a good look at the Eugene Talmadge Memorial Bridge. Talmadge, former governor and committed segregationist is not a popular figure these days so efforts have been made to change the name to Tomochichi, the Native American chief who was instrumental in the founding of Charleston.

We went out to Tybee Island.



The Tybee lighthouse was originally built in 1736 as a day time light, and it was destroyed by a storm. This lighthouse dates back to 1773.

It was made taller in 1867 and now is 47 meters tall.

The last head keeper’s cottage is now a living museum.

Around Savannah we had seen some intriguing paintings like this one. We saw it was signed by Panhandle Slim. We later learned that is the artistic name of Scott Stanton. Originally from the panhandle of Florida, he now lives in Savannah.

We went to visit the amazing southern writer Flannery O’Connor’s childhood home that is now a museum, and there were more Panhandle Slim paintings with Flannery quotations.



This is the exterior of the tenement where Flannery and her parents Edward and Regina O’Connor lived until Flannery was 13. The building was owned by Regina's cousin Kate who had inherited it. She was very generous with the O’Connors.



This is a photo of Mary Flannery (as she would have been called as a girl) with her mother Regina.



The tour was excellent. We learned that Flannery gave her first "reading" in the upstairs bathroom, with two friends asked to sit in the bathtub. Notice the pillows in the bathtub and the flowers around the toilet, the throne where Flannery sat to read her stories or other books to her friends.



When Flannery turned six years old, she announced she was no longer a child. She started calling her parents by their first names and insisted on going to the adult mass at church. She was a literary critic from an early age, “Not a very good book.” was her pithy criticism of The Fairy Babies.



This is finger puppet named Flannel-ry O’Connor by Betsy Cain.



The spires of the Cathedral of St John the Baptist were visible from their upstairs window. The family was very religious and went to mass every day.



We visited the Cathedral too.



The next day we left Savannah to drive to Alabama. Along the way we stopped at Andalusia, the farm where Flannery and Regina lived after Edward died from lupus. Flannery moved back to live with her mother after her she herself suffered her first strong attack from lupus. By then Flannery had earned her bachelors degree and a masters in creative writing, and was living near New York City. There were Panhandle Slim paintings in the Andalusia gift shop too. The guide told us that one day the three paintings had appeared on the front gate.



All her life Flannery had been very fond of all types of fowl. She claimed the highlight of her life happened when she was five years old and trained her chicken to walk backwards, which was captured on film for a news reel. This photo shows Flannery with her pet ducks and peacocks.



This was Flannery’s room. She was diagnosed with lupus when she was 25, but she continued to live and write at Andalucia for 13 years. This photo doesn’t show her seven bookcases, her pride and joy, which she could see from her bed as she went to sleep each night. Flannery died in 1964.



We planned our stops in Alabama to highlight Civil Rights history. In Selma we visited the Edward Pettus Bridge where in 1965 the State Troopers attacked Civil Rights Protesters, injuring 50 people including John Lewis.



Two weeks later Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. came to Selma and led a 4-day march to the capitol Montgomery. The march started on the bridge.



This mural in Montgomery by Sunny Paulk features Dr. King, Corretta Scott King, John Lewis and Rev. Ralph Abernathy, the leaders of this historic march.



In Guided by Justice the artist Dana King commemorates the Montgomery bus boycott of 1956 by depicting the thousands of miles walked by black women during that time as they fought to end segregation in public transportation. Rosa Parks is the first figure.



Since the new National Memorial for Peace and Justice opened last year we have wanted to see it, and we found it incredibly moving. The rectangular rusted metal boxes you can see in this photo represent each county where lynchings occurred.



In response to the South losing the Civil War and the subsequent Reconstruction phase, Jim Crow laws were passed by states as a backlash to maintain white supremacy. Between 1870 and 1945 there were 4,400 known lynchings of African Americans. This memorial includes the names of each victim if it is known, along with the county and date.



Lynching, which often included torturing the victim for hours first, was a form of domestic terrorism and resulted in millions of African-Americans fleeing the violence in the South. In this section of the memorial we were able to walk under the metal boxes, which were suspended like bodies hanging from a tree. On the wall was this statement:

For the hanged and beaten.
For the shot, drowned and burned.
For the tortured, tormented and terrorized.
For those abandoned by the rule of law. 

We will remember. 

With hope because hopelessness is the enemy of justice.
With courage because peace requires bravery.
With persistence because justice is a constant struggle.
With faith because we shall overcome.

Csilla was shocked at the huge number of lynchings and the fact that they occurred as late as 1945. It is surprising that it took until this year—2019—for the US to make lynching a federal crime, thanks to the leadership of Senators Kamala Harris and Corey Booker.

In the foreground the metal boxes with the names of the victims are laid out like coffins. These are duplicates of the hanging boxes and will be given to each county where there were lynchings, to be erected locally so that this shameful history will be acknowledged.



The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) built the National Monument for Peace and Justice in 2018. Here is a statement by their founder Bryan Stevenson:

“To create greater awareness and understanding about racial terror lynchings, and to begin a necessary conversation that advances truth and reconciliation, EJI is working with communities to commemorate and recognize the traumatic era of lynching by collecting soil from lynching sites across the country and erecting historical markers and monuments in these spaces.”

Hank Willis Thomas created this sculpture entitled Raise Up in 2016. He said, “Black and brown people in the US are often presumed guilty when they have done nothing wrong…Police shootings, excessive sentencing and abusive conditions in prison make mass incarceration a dominant issue for the poor and people of color.” We recommend The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander because it "challenges the civil rights community—and all of us—to place mass incarceration at the forefront of a new movement for racial justice in America."



We were moved by these sentiments from the author Toni Morrison.



This map shows the counties where lynchings occurred and highlights the fact that from east Texas moving east the map is almost solid red. And looking closely at the map, Mississippi appears to have only 4 counties without known lynchings. Even California had two known lynchings in Kern County.



The magnolia trees at the National Monument were blooming.



EJI also built the nearby Legacy Museum. We visited it but photography was not allowed so we can only share this image we got from their website. There were incredible illustrations in a number of the museum videos that were painted by Molly Crabapple. Here’s a link to the Racial Terror Lynching in America Animated that shows this important history in a compelling way.



In Birmingham we went to the 16th Street Baptist Church. During the Civil Rights Movement, the church was also a meeting place for civil rights activities. We learned that Birmingham was probably the most segregated city in the US in 1963.



The church was bombed by the Ku Klux Klan, causing the deaths of four young black girls: Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Denise McNair and Carole Robertson.



This event galvanized the federal government to take action and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed, which outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. John Coltrane wrote the song Alabama to commemorate the tragedy. And this sculpture entitled The Four Spirits by Birmingham-born sculptor Elizabeth MacQueen was installed in the park across the street in 2013.

Kelly Ingram Park across from the church had other civil rights sculptures, reminding us of the brutal racial suppression of this time and the importance of leaders like Dr Martin Luther King.



This sculpture memorializes the 1963 protests to end segregation in schools, which included Bull Connor using water cannons on protesting students and locking them up in the jail until there were no more cells to hold them. The text below the students says, “Ain’t afraid of your jail”.

Csilla remembered that while she was living in Minnesota in 1963 she saw video on TV of the police and dogs attacking the student protesters, and the images stayed with her. This photograph by Bill Hudson was published in the New York Times.

We also visited the Bethel Baptist Church, which served as headquarters for the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights under the leadership of the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth. Because of the church’s visibility in the fight for integration, segregationists targeted the church with bombs on three separate occasions. Today it's still an active church as well as a National Historic Landmark. While revisiting this history was painful, we realized that some progress was made through the struggles but that we still have a long way to go in order to have a truly equal and just country.



Our final lunch of the trip was a highlight. We went to Eli’s Jerusalem Grill and ordered lots of vegan dishes, including (from left) spicy carrots, falafel balls, couscous, tabouleh, baba ganoush, hummus, cabbage salad and beet salad. The beet salad was especially good and reminded Csilla of a Hungarian beet salad that is also spiced with caraway seeds.



What a great trip!



Next we head to Tucson, Arizona to start training on our tandem bicycle.