The Other South Coast

For years, when people asked if I’d been to Georgia, I told them I’d been to Atlanta more than a dozen times – I’d toured the CNN studios and drank bottles of Sweetwater 420 at bars in Buckhead, had biscuits at Cracker Barrel and navigated a half-dozen streets named Peachtree. Their response was always the same. “You haven’t been to Georgia.”

I laughed at what I thought was a joke. And then I went south and found out they were right. But not in the ways I had imagined.

When a girl from Southern California plans a trip to small-town Georgia, she has certain expectations. That old joke comes to mind: “How do you know they invented the toothbrush in [insert name of small town]? Otherwise it would have been called the teethbrush.”

In all my travels from Macon to Valdosta to Savannah to Brunswick, I did not find the gum-baring hillbillies I was looking for. In fact, I found one of the most aristocratic communities still going, tucked right into one of the country’s most scenic and undeveloped coastlines.

Georgia’s 100-mile coast is dotted top to bottom with barrier islands, and they are practically untouched, thanks to an unlikely source – wealthy industrialists who bought the islands as summer getaways (think the Astors, Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, and R.J. Reynolds). Today some isles are privately owned, some house affluent neighborhoods and others have turned into wildlife refuges and state parks with limited visitation. All offer romantic views of marshes and moss-covered live oaks that would make a landscape artist pant.

And on one island, you’ll still find that old-money luxury, that genteel, slow Southern elegance of mint juleps and bourbon milk punches, horseback riding and skeet shooting. Privately owned and gated, Sea Island is one of the most exclusive enclaves in the South. It is home to the outrageously luxurious Sea Island Resort with its Lodge at Sea Island Golf Club and the historic Cloister hotel.

Originally built in 1928 and designed by famed Palm Beach architect Addison Mizner, The Cloister hotel catered to tycoons from around the nation, as well as President Calvin Coolidge, who in its opening year planted the first of the many commemorative oaks that line the property (five U.S. presidents, two U.K. prime ministers and a queen of the Netherlands have since followed suit). These well-heeled visitors came to play golf and tennis, to lie on the beach, to sail, and to listen to lectures or harp concerts in the Spanish Lounge. Four generations later, travelers come for the same things, and of course these days, they’ll also enjoy the Mobil Five-Star spa.

In 2006, Sea Island re-opened The Cloister after a $500-million reconstruction that ushered in a 65,000 square-foot spa, new stables, a new tennis club, and three new restaurants. And though the main building was modernized and expanded, its storied Spanish Lounge was recreated beam by cypress beam, with its original stained glass windows and marble mantel intact. Visitors who knew and loved the first Cloister regularly marvel at the replica.

They’re not the only ones impressed. Shortly after the unveiling, the resort began racking up the accolades. Both The Cloister and The Lodge have earned Mobil Five-Star status, as has the spa, and The Georgian Room, a formal dinner-only restaurant with chandeliers, harps and a commitment to farm-to-table organic cuisine. Golf Digest has named it number one in the U.S. among the World’s Top 50 Golf Hotels and Travel + Leisure has called it one of the world’s Top 100 Hotels.

Most of The Cloister’s 175 rooms overlook the Black Banks River or the Atlantic, and all are lavishly decorated with handmade Turkish rugs, overstuffed leather furniture, formal drapes, and antique pieces. To stay in touch guests will be provided with personalized stationery, and probably more conveniently, in-room Wi-Fi.

Many guests choose not to leave the resort during their stay, and who can blame them with a lineup of activities from marsh kayaking to boating (aboard the Cloister Belle, a restored classic 71-foot yacht), horseback riding, tennis, and shooting, and of course, golfing the complex’s 54 scenic holes. And these aren’t just amusements as they might be elsewhere. Take a class at the shooting school, one of the nation’s best, of course, and it will be a rigorous exercise among the competitive five-stand sporting clay field, two skeet ranges and trap field. A golf lesson will be at the Golf Learning Center, where award-winning instructors will offer multi-disciplined programs, including club fitting, swing and short game analysis, performance psychology, and golf fitness. Over at the stables, you’ll be able to choose between beach and trail rides, ring rides and lessons from beginning to competitive.

Mostly, visitors don’t want to leave the magical atmosphere of elegance and Southern hospitality. You don’t need one of the rooms with 24-hour butler service to be fawned over. When I was packing up, a gardener manicuring The Cloister gardens came running to put my bags in the trunk. Whatever level room you book, you will be treated like royalty, or at least a statesman. Sea Island had enough polish to host the 2004 G8 Summit and cater to heads of state from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

While you don’t need to leave Sea Island, you should. Particularly if a gilt-edged grand hotel doesn’t sound like the “real” Georgia to you. You’ll find Beluga caviar, black truffles or raw oysters on hand-painted china in the resort, but on the outside, you shouldn’t miss boiled peanuts, shrimp and grits or steamed oysters with hot sauce on Saltine crackers – a local tradition. This part of the state is renowned for its seafood, and thanks to a confluence of silty rivers, produces some of the best shellfish available. Locals gather the family for low-country boils (seasoned shrimp, sausage, corn, and potatoes) or pick up a bushel of oysters and roast them over a backyard fire. To experience the down-home version of seafood head to adjacent St. Simons Island for Frederica House (3611 Frederica Rd.) or Mullet Bay (512 Ocean Blvd.).

Great seafood or not, since this is the South, you can’t leave without a dose of barbecue. Whatever you do, do not miss Mack’s Barbecue (2809 Glynn Ave.), across the causeway in Brunswick, the nearest mainland, where three dollars will get you the best pulled-pork sandwich around. Sides include Southern favorites like fried okra, baked beans and sweet potato fries, but get the barbecue-flavored Brunswick stew. There is some debate over the dish’s origin – Brunswick, Virginia also claims to have created it. After slurping it up, you’ll see why and try to replicate the recipe in your kitchen at home. Or if you really want to wander deep into the real South, stop by the famous Willie’s Wee-Nee Wagon (3599 Altama Ave., Brunswick), where the pork chop sandwich is so good, they’ll give you $2,000 if you find a better one.

The surrounding islands are also steeped in history, so after your skeet shooting and five-star spa-ing, take a look around the neighborhood. The Golden Isles, as the chain of Sea Island’s four neighbors is known, were once home to Native American settlements and 16th century Spanish missions (The Cloister’s Spanish style is not uninspired), and you can still visit an 18th century English fort, the nation’s first Methodist church, an antebellum plantation, and another elite industrialist enclave – the Jekyll Island Club whose members included the Morgans, the Rockefellers and the Vanderbilts. Even if you don’t buy their brand of conspicuous consumption, one thing should be obvious – these families could be anywhere in the world, so they fell hard for south Georgia for a reason. Find out what it was. Besides, like 15 minutes of fame, everyone deserves to be a blue blood for a few days.