The Savannah River has carried commerce, cotton, and ocean-going vessels inland for nearly three centuries, but its role as a leisure corridor began in earnest when paddlewheel excursion boats returned to the harbor in the 1980s. The waterway divides Georgia from South Carolina along a channel that once saw shipyards, rice plantations, and Civil War blockade runners. Today the river moves at a tidal rhythm, rising and falling twice daily with the Atlantic's pulse fourteen miles downstream. A sunset river cruise Savannah GA departs from the cobblestone wharves of River Street, where nineteenth-century cotton warehouses now house galleries and taverns. The paddlewheel riverboat—a steel-hulled replica styled after the steam packets that plied these waters in the 1800s—carries passengers past the Port of Savannah's container cranes, the Talmadge Memorial Bridge's twin cantilever spans, and the marshlands of Hutchinson Island. The western sky ignites in shades of persimmon and violet as the vessel turns back toward the city's tiered bluff, its triple decks open to the October breeze. The river's width at this reach—nearly a quarter mile—allows unobstructed views of Savannah's skyline, a composition of church spires, Italianate cornices, and live oaks draped in Spanish moss. Fort Jackson, an 1808 brick fortification downstream, marks the narrowing of the channel where Confederate forces once anchored a defensive boom. Upriver, the Savannah Belles Ferry crosses between landings, its wake carving silver lines in the copper-toned water. Dolphins occasionally surface near the shipping lanes, their dorsals cutting the current in pursuit of mullet and shrimp. Evening departures from River Street occur year-round, the schedule adjusted for the season's shifting daylight. Autumn cruises benefit from moderate humidity and the slant of late-afternoon sun, which casts long shadows across the water and illuminates the façades along Bay Street. The riverboat's open promenade deck and interior salon accommodate groups, though seating on the upper level remains first-come. The vessel's twin paddlewheels—driven by diesel rather than steam—churn audibly as the boat pulls from the dock at seven o'clock, the cityscape receding into silhouette.