Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Charleston, a Week's Layover

InSpeyered 2 spent an entire week tied to the dock at the Charleston Maritime Center.  Al was away 3 days for his jaunt to Miami and I walked the streets for hours seeing sights, getting a much needed hair cut, getting a pedicure, buying stuff and cleaning the boat.  I also had a day with the sister of my dear friend Jayme, who died just before we left on this trip last September, so I enjoyed a special day with Charlene.  She took me to the Magnolia Plantation where we toured the grand house and the beautiful gardens around it.  What a treat to go somewhere in a car so even a Walmart run was accomplished easily!
This is the entryway to the house surrounded by live oaks hundreds of years old.  Interesting how so many of the old plantation homes suffered from fires and were rebuilt sometimes more than once and yet these old trees keep on standing tall despite fire and hurricanes!
A beautiful spot on the grounds that is a place for artists to paint and brides to have pictures taken.
This tree, "Angel Oak" is on John's Island and is thought to be the oldest live oak in South Carolina.  She brags to be at least 500 years old.  Charlene remembers climbing this tree and bringing her kids here for picnics but now the tree has been "discovered" so has signs all over to stay off and she has her own visitor's center to entertain the throngs of visitors.
 One day Al and I took a water taxi over to Mt. Pleasant where the Yorktown aircraft carrier is docked and open for tours.  We opted to take a long walk to a pier instead of touring the navy boats.
This is my favorite house in Charleston; I passed it every day on my way to the old town area. The locals simply refer to these "sideways" homes (my term) as single homes.  Most of them have iron beams imbedded into the bricks to hold them together during earthquakes.  The last quake was in the 1800's but apparently Charleston sits on a large fault line so these homes need to be protected.  We had a wonderful dinner with fellow boaters who are gold loopers and harbor hosts for Charleston and learned that Charleston has laws disallowing the destruction of any historic buildings so the city has the most antebellum homes in the US,

Al took this from the second floor marina balcony of our view across the Cooper River after we had dinner with Erik's good friend Austin who is Jayme's son.  Charleston was a good stop over for us since we had local folks to visit. 

InSpeyered 2 siting in the marina where we practically had the whole place to ourselves! 

We finally took off from Charleston on Sunday morning, 5/22 and passed by Sullivan's Island with more lovely low country homes on its shores.  Now on to a couple of nights on anchor on our way to Myrtle Beach. 



3 comments:

  1. We went to Magnolia Plantation two years ago. Did you notice the pictures of Sarah Grimke on the wall who was the first women's libber? The Invention of Wings is about her life, by Sue Monk Kidd. My book group read it. Having just been at her home made it all the more meaningful. Glad Al's eye news was good. Enjoy Indy! Nancy

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  2. We went to Magnolia Plantation two years ago. Did you notice the pictures of Sarah Grimke on the wall who was the first women's libber? The Invention of Wings is about her life, by Sue Monk Kidd. My book group read it. Having just been at her home made it all the more meaningful. Glad Al's eye news was good. Enjoy Indy! Nancy

    ReplyDelete