Travelin' Road Show: 11/22/13

Fri Nov 22nd - Charleston South Carolina

Patrick and Earl.. looking down Church St.

Beautiful lush gardens

Beautiful homes

We decided that a 10:30am civil-war walking tour would be a good introduction to the city. As Charleston is a two hour plus drive, we were up early (for us ) and off we went. We arrived in Charleston just before 10.30am but missed the tour ... if indeed the one we wanted was running that day. ...lesson learned...pre-book wherever possible.

'Front door' of a Charleston 'Single' House

Stucco etched to look like stone blocks

Patrick and Earl

Janice and 'Earl'

Anyway we decided to do a horse drawn carriage tour and figured that all tours would originate at the Visitors' centre located North of where we were, so we began the mile+ walk up Meeting Road. At the centre we learned that the horse drawn carriage tours begin near the bottom of Meeting Road at the Market Place..Who Knew?? So we decided to take the free trolley back down... they are every 15 minutes! After 34 minutes it arrived and we took it back into the historic district where we had started. From the trolley stop we hoofed it to the Carriage tour company to discover that next tour would be in 35 minutes. What a great start (not!!) ..we’d been in the city for over two hours and hadn’t even got started !

Interesting colour tree (Bark is light)

Same tree (anyone know what it is??)

Well the "Old Country" carriage tour turned out to be quite a good. Our driver was a student of architecture and we learned much about the building styles and stories of the past. We saw many of the famous Charleston Single Houses, so named because they are a single room wide. However they are very deep. The 'front door' on the street is actually fake as it leads to a long porch, half way down which is the real entry to the house. If the 'fake' entry door was closed it meant the resident was either out, or did not want visitors, if open, then visitors were welcome. We saw some of the last remaining wooden houses (most were burned down over the years in large fires in the city). The newer brick buildings were often covered in stucco and then etched to be made to look like stone blocks. After we said goodbye to Patrick (our carriage driver) and Earl (the horse) we toured the market on foot. Very interesting stuff including sweet grass hand woven roses and bowls, sesame wafers, dried okra snacks, and lots of artisan jewelry. Wallets intact we then went on our own walking tour of the historic district and waterfront by following a 'walking tour' guidebook we bought at the visitors centre. We picked up most of the points of interest in the old historic district (slave markets, old taverns and homes etc. During our self guided tour we enjoyed a delicious Belgian Caffe Latte (Janice) and a phenomenal Pistachio ice cream (Derek) as we looked out over the harbour. After a couple of hours walking we decided some 'real' food was in order. We didn’t actually find the type of bistro the we were searching for, so gave up and decided to go to James Bay County Island for the Festival of Lights.
The Festival was very reminiscent of Vancouver's Stanley Park Festival that we have been to a couple of times with Evan. We drove through the light display first in the truck. Then we parked and walked through the 'Santa Village'. We took the Santa Express Train through more light display areas (actually a john Deere tractor in disguise) and we ooooh’ d and aah’d our way around like a couple of kids while bobbing away to the Christmas songs. Finally, the Cheese/Jalapeno stuffed pretzels were something else. (especially as we had no lunch or dinner!!) The festival was a fun event, and we were glad to have been there. We drove home and arrived back at about 10.30pm, settled in and watched the news and a movie (Couples?) so to a very late bed.

All in all quite the day, it started out with all sorts of delays, but we loved Charleston. The history, the architecture, the stories of the slave trade, plantations and southern belles. The cobbled streets were made using rocks that were originally used as a ballast in the ships coming over from England, and deposited at the dock. The ships then refilled the space with indigo, cotton and lumber etc for the return trip. The old buildings from the 1700 and 1800's. The stories of a bygone era, of hurricanes and earthquakes and those city fires that destroyed 200, 500 and 600 homes at a time. Yes Charleston is certainly a fabulous city today and yesterday!
ENJOY THE REST OF THE PHOTOS FROM OUR DAY: