Georgia and South Carolina - March 2025
Florida - we live where you Spring Break.
When you’ve got a four-year-old, Spring Break takes on a entirely different tone. It’s less beer bongs and more family-friendly breweries. Less Girls Gone Wild (thank God that’s not a thing anymore) and more Girl’s Gonna Go To Bed By 9:30 PM.
This Spring Break, we hopped in the car and drove north to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, stopping in Savannah, Georgia and Summerville, South Carolina along the way.
Why Myrtle Beach, you ask?
Because if you sit through a timeshare presentation with a four-year-old, you get two things:
An oceanfront room at $100 a night.
The desire to drink turpentine because oh my God, you have to sit through a time share presentation with a four-year-old whose new favorite thing is pro-wrestling.
To his credit, Will held it together and was remarkably well-behaved for the entirety of the presentation which lasted from 8:45am to 12:20pm which is about three hours longer than it needed to be
Travel is my favorite thing in this world and my Bucket List is ever-evolving and currently features the spots on this list.
The Reality of Road Tripping with a Preschooler
We were coming right off the heels of a family trip to Gainesville, which had culminated in me, Will, my sister, her partner, my nephew, and my parents all catching Norovirus.
Gainesville is about 270 miles from West Palm Beach and usually takes about four hours on the Florida Turnpike. That return trip took seven hours because we had to stop three separate times due to vomiting.
It was… not great.
Also, now that Will is older and more active, road trips are his least favorite thing on earth. He’s normally not allowed to use his tablet in the car, but around hour three and a half, the poor kid was bored out of his mind. I-95 through Central Florida isn’t exactly scenic, so I figured a little tablet time wasn't the worst idea.
Only, it was.
Fifteen minutes into watching pro-wrestling matches, the poor little guy threw up all over himself. We pulled into a gas station, cleaned him up as best as we could, and continued on our way because, well, that’s really all you can do.
Savannah: Ghosts, History, and Southern Gothic Charm
We finally arrived in Savannah, Georgia around dinner time and headed straight to The Pirate’s House.
This is a great spot if you’ve got kids who love pirates or if you’re an adult who appreciates a strong tropical alcoholic beverage after a long day on the road.
One of my favorite things about Savannah is that it’s rich with history, especially of the Southern Gothic-Flannery O’Connor variety. I love macabre stories and I love the spooky side of life, so as a result, I’ve done ghost tours in Nashville, Asheville and New Orleans.
The Genteel and Bard’s Walking Ghost Tour was better than all of them. Our host Jiovanny was engaging and empathetic. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone talk about maternal mental health during a ghost tour and I really appreciated the nuanced perspective.
The next day, we explored more of the city and ended up in Tybee Island for dinner and a dolphin-spotting expedition.
Finding the Zen (or Boredom) in Myrtle Beach
After a quick stop in Summerville to visit some friends, we finally arrived in Myrtle Beach. We stayed at an oceanfront resort (courtesy of our timeshare survival reward), and while places like Pier 14 offered a killer view, the culinary scene left a lot to be desired.
For some reason completely unfathomable to me, Will is currently obsessed with fishing. Or rather, he thinks he is. To scratch the itch, we took him out to Apache Pier - the longest wooden pier on the Eastern Seaboard - to cast a line and pass the time.
It was here that my kid learned the hard truth: it’s called fishing, not catching. In all honesty, fishing is a pretty zen pastime. But when you’re four years old, "zen" quickly translates to boring as fuck.
A few words on Myrtle Beach itself. It has gorgeous natural scenery, they have absolutely nailed the concept of Southern hospitality, and it is incredibly family-friendly with great playgrounds and endless mini-golf. It’s clean, efficient, and packed with things to do - just like Orlando.
But here’s the rub. I went to UCF and I live just two hours away from "The City Beautiful." I am perfectly cool with not vacationing in Orlando or Orlando-esque places.
This was bad news for the timeshare sales guys, because that commercialized, manicured predictability was their major selling point. They tried hitting me with other pitches:
"Check out beautiful, sexy Miami, Florida!" No, thank you please. I’ve been stuck on the Golden Glades Interchange on a Friday afternoon before. I’m good.
"Our resorts have beautiful pools!" I have a beautiful pool in my backyard and our swimming with dogs policy is super liberal.
Look, I get that when some people go on vacation, they want exactly that - a comfortable room, a clean pool and a chance to relax. But I am just not that girl.
One of my favorite travel memories is when we visited Chicago a few years ago. We stayed in an apartment in the Ukrainian Village, grabbed coffee at the truly excellent Dark Matter Coffee and just wandered around the neighborhood.
We were standing outside a neighborhood church admiring the architecture when a priest ushered us inside and gave us a private, 45-minute tour and art history lesson. I am a godless heathen, and I still count that as one of the best travel experiences of my life.
I like exploring communities - wandering side streets, sitting at a local bar talking to the regulars, checking out the local grocery store and seeing the mundane details of everyday life while imagining what it would be like to live there. When you stay tucked away inside a sterile resort, you can’t get moments like that. It’s all just… sameness. Like living in The Giver.
A Gainesville Homecoming
Our trip culminated in a final stop back in Gainesville - home to Tom Petty, my sister, and my husband alma mater, the University of Florida.
Will got to hang out and run wild with his cousin, John got to watch the UF Gators beat Texas Tech in basketball and I got to spend quality time with my sister.
Honestly, hanging out with her is one of my favorite things in this world because, oh my God, has everyone else on the planet completely forgotten how to properly gossip?
Did Y'all Eat?
The culinary side of this trip was a wild ride of extreme highs and some tragic, public-school-cafeteria lows. Here is the official breakdown of what we ate:
Sundae Cafe at Tybee
Tybee Island, GA
The best meal we had during the entire trip. I started with dessert in the form of a pecan pie martini.
I had the fried pimento cheese with green tomato and yellow pepper jam, alongside fresh biscuits with sweet peach preserves both incredible. But the dish I will think about for the rest of my life is their boiled peanut succotash.
Made with blackened roasted sweet potatoes, peppers, onions, corn and tender boiled peanuts, it was fresh, perfectly seasoned, and a total revelation. This is exactly the kind of innovative, produce-forward dish the Southern Foodways Alliance bangs the drum about.
Beach Hippie Coffee
Myrtle Beach, SC
I loved the vibes and the creative coffee drinks, Will loved this rainbow bagel. This was probably the best dining experience we had in Myrtle Beach.
I know there is great food in Myrtle Beach. There has to be. We just didn’t find it.
We stopped by Voodoo Brewing Company after a long timeshare presentation. The beers were fantastic and the vibe was great - lots of space for kids to run around and a giant Jenga game. The pizza, however, looked and tasted like an elementary school cafeteria rectangle. A literal hate crime against Italians.
We had dinner one night at Fiesta Mexicana, ordered spicy food and ended up with one of the most bland meals I’ve ever eaten.
The mango margarita was a little too sweet for me but it was a decent cocktail and yes, that’s watery salsa roja in the little carafe.
And as mentioned before, Pier 14 has a great view and sadly enough, that is the best thing I can say about the meal we ate.
Hook & Barrel
Myrtle Beach, SC
The last night in town, we had dinner at one of the best restaurants in town - Hook & Barrel. It’s a beautiful space and the service is the epitome of Southern hospitality but the food just didn’t hit. I ordered the H&B House Salad (grapes, feta, ribbons of cucumber and pistachios on a bed of mixed greens dressed with a white balsamic) and it was…fine.
We all liked the pimento cheese and cracker amuse-bouche and the s’mores skillet for dessert, though.
Humble Wood Fire Bagels
Gainesville, FL
My favorite bagel joint in Gainesville happens to be in the same spot as my favorite coffee joint (Opus) and my favorite pizza joint (Satch Squared).
I’m usually a Double-Toasted Everything Bagel With Light Veggie Cream Cheese Girl but Humble Fire makes the best, crunchiest nut butter and strawberry jelly bagels on the planet and I try to get one every time I’m in town. You should do the same.
The Takeaway
Would I go back to Myrtle Beach?
Maybe... but I’m far more inclined to visit the North Georgia mountains, Asheville, Nashville,\ or New Orleans again. Will I road trip through the South again? Absolutely.
I love the South. I believe in the South.
And though I was born in England and live in South Florida, which is, sociologically, about as far north as you can get while living in the geographic south, I do consider myself a Bitter Southerner.
The South is filled with complex stories, delicious food, incredible architecture, soulful music, and really good fucking people who are working like hell to make things better, kinder, and more humane. Those voices deserve to be elevated, not drowned out, and definitely not mocked.
The South deserves to be explored, and I cannot wait for our next adventure.
I just need to find some better food recommendations.
