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In most cities, you hail down a taxi and drive in silence to your destination. At best, the driver comments on the weather, or is talking on his cell phone in an indecipherable language. You’ll pay your fare and think how uneventful and efficient that taxi ride was, if you think of it at all.

That’s not often the case in Savannah. The profession of “taxi driver” has always been a draw for eccentrics and, in a city full of eccentrics, you really get the crème de la crème. Every time we’ve hailed a cab, it’s been a memorable experience. There was the unappreciated poet who insisted we read his work before we left the car. The guy who’d met Paula Deen‘s husband and talked bitterly about how it should have been him (“What a woman”). Or the freakishly large, bearded dude telling us in a strong Southern drawl about his favorite Gentlemen’s Club, Temptations, while convincing us that the night was still ripe for a peek in at Pinkie Master’s, after all.

Savannah is a place which seems to breed interesting situations. The last time we were in a cab, going around City Market, the energetic driver was going on, laughing and screeching about some drunk kid he’d just carted home when, in front of our car, a street fight broke out. The cop standing nearby smiled and shook his head, having apparently seen it all before, and our taxi driver began cackling out loud, loving the action. I looked at Juergen next to me in the back seat. “This is why I love Savannah.”

- Pirate’s House in Savannah