Have you ever been so intrigued by a movie that you felt compelled to visit the filming locations?
After watching “The Notebook” an American love movie (2004), I decided to visit Charleston, South Carolina.
The movie was set in the 1940s. A mill worker named Noah Calhoun and an heiress Allie Hamilton desperately fall in love with each other but are separated by Allie’s upper-class mother, who believes Allie deserves someone better. Noah later enlists to fight in World War II. When he returns from the war, he finds out that Allie is engaged to a rich lawyer. He decides to restore an abandoned house which he once promised Allie he would purchase and fix according to Allie’s preferences as their home. Allie is surprised by seeing the photo of Noah and the house in a newspaper. She decides to meet Noah before she gets married. Their love rekindles. Allie eventually marries Noah, her soulmate. After many years, Allie and Noah both live in a nursing home where Noah reads a romantic story (their own story) from his notebook to Allie, again and again, to help her remember since Allie is suffering from dementia. In the end, they are dying together in their sleep in Allie’s bed.
It was such an achingly beautiful story which touched my heart softly. I was deeply moved by the enduring love between Allie and Noah. I was also attracted by the scenic views in the movie, especially the scene when they biked through a forest. I’ve never seen that kind of tree before, although I’ve gone camping in the woods numerous times in different states in the US, such as Vermont and Maine. The trees in the movie seemed hairy with their branches widely stretched out. After searching online, I found out that most of the scenes were filmed in Charleston, South Carolina.
I packed my suitcase with dresses like what Allie wears in the movie and booked a flight to Charleston.
It was a lovely and cheerful town with colonial-style houses painted in bright colours. Strolling on the cobblestone streets along the seaside, the sun seemed to shine through me.
Though lively and beautiful, I didn’t spend too much time in downtown Charleston. Instead, I travelled 15 miles northwest of Charleston to a spot called the Middleton Place, a plantation firstly built in the 1730s, which captured my heart. It was not the exact place where The Notebook was filmed. But I finally saw those hairy trees from the movie – the Southern oak tree, so many of them!
The first one appeared in front of a small bridge over a muddy road beside a little pond. It was so quiet and the air was still. Through the softly hanging “tree hair”, I saw a blue dragonfly swiftly skimming over the calm surface of the water. Surrounded by trees and plants, I felt that I was in a perfectly selected movie set. There might jump out a giant talking rabbit from the woods anytime. I later knew the draping “hair” was named Spanish moss. The funny thing is that the Spanish moss is neither moss nor from Spain. According to Wikipedia, it is “a flowering plant in the family Bromeliaceae.” The name was given by French explorers since the “tree hair” reminded them of the Spanish conquistadors’ long beard. It absorbs nutrients and water through its leaves from the air and rainfall. Thus they do no harm to the oak tree.*
I lay down in the grass under an oak tree, feeling light like a drifting cloud. The Spanish moss waved tenderly, shading the bright ray of the sun and revealing the shape of the wind.
A while later, cello music flowed in the air. I checked around and found a small group of cellists rehearsing for a wedding reception that evening. How wonderful!
At dusk, with the reflection of all kinds of plants, the lake became an oil painting with a warm golden tone. It was heavenly beautiful that I just couldn’t keep my eyes off.
It was a fantastic trip down to the South that began with a love movie but ended with a lot of discoveries, not only the romantic scenic views but also the history of American Civil War and slavery. It was like walking through a small door but finding a whole new world. I think that’s the best part of traveling – not just beautiful sceneries but the indigenous culture, local people, and history of the destination that enrich my life experience and deepens my understanding of the world around me.