Charleston Part 1

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Our next destination after Brunswick Georgia was the Charleston South Carolina area. We have been wanting to check out Charleston for some time. Last spring, we stayed in Santee SC but town was almost 70 miles from camp so we never made it. There aren’t a lot of campgrounds near Charleston and since we likely would only head into town for a day or two at most, we decided to pick a state park about 35 miles out of town. Givhans Ferry State Park sounded like a nice place and actually has full hookups (water, electric and sewer) - rather unusual for a state park. We had booked our site for 7 nights back in the middle of November once we had determined enough of our intended travel plans for 2022.

It’s 171 miles from Brunswick to Givhans Ferry. The bulk of the drive was easy up I-95 but the last 20 miles along SC-61 wasn’t a lot of fun. It’s a fairly narrow 2 lane road without a shoulder and the rumble strips are right along the center and edge stripes. Let’s just say it required a lot of attention to keep the rig between the lines. We were arriving on a Saturday afternoon. Generally it’s not a good idea to arrive at a state park in the middle of the weekend but surprisingly the campground wasn’t full. Plus the sites are large enough and spaced far enough apart that there was no real issue backing into our site. The campground road and all the sites are gravel but fairly level and in good shape. We did quickly discover that both our Verizon and T-Mobile service was quite poor here. Even with our cell booster on the roof, I could barely check emails. On the plus side we actually had excellent over the air TV reception. We did find that the ranger office had reasonable Wi-Fi and several benches outside to sit and do internet things when required.

Chris wanted to go to an old time plantation. There are actually a fair number of them in this part of South Carolina. She studied the options and picked Middleton Place - less than a 20 mile drive from camp. It was a popular place but since it comprises 110 acres, once we got past the parking area and entrance station, it didn’t seem crowded. Admission is $29 per person and we also signed up for the $15 house tour. We had more than a half an hour before our tour, so we slowly wandered the grounds as we made our way to the house.

Reflection Pool at Middleton Place

To say the grounds are meticulously cared for would be an understatement. We were there on a Sunday so there wasn’t a large crew out working. But a few guys were picking up folding chairs from one of the gardens - likely from a wedding ceremony yesterday. We enjoyed the walk thru some of the gardens as we headed towards the house. There are numerous statues scattered around the various garden areas. The Middleton Oak is a very impressive tree. Believed to be close to 1000 years old, it has a circumference of 37 feet! Over the years, some of the larger limbs were lost in storms, but it still is very pretty next to the Ashley River.

Wood Nymph Statue

We're Having a Party!

Middleton Oak

Part of Octagonal Garden

We arrived at the main house with about half a dozen others for the tour. Only people that paid for the tour are allowed in the house and they do not permit any photography inside the house. It turns out this house, built in 1755, was not the original home. The original house was built in 1705. Fifty years later, two “flanker” homes were built on either side of the main home to provide room for the expanding family. During the Civil war in 1865, the main home and the north flanker were burned beyond repair. The remaining south flanker was restored and became the family home. The other two buildings were completely toppled from the earthquake of 1886.

South Flanker / Museum

Ruins of Main House

After the tour, we continued exploring the plantation on our own. There are lots of pools and ponds dotting the landscape. The Old Spring House next to the Mill Pond had several gators snoozing in the sun. Next to this pond is the Mill. It has lots of displays inside describing its use to grind corn. A path thru the woods rises above the pond and permits a great view of the beauty of the area.

Spring House and Mill Pond

Gators Basking in Sun

Turtle Emerges from Mill Pond

Colorful Trees

View from Hillside

Turtles and Gator

Middleton Place wasn’t one of the main plantations for producing rice, but it wasn’t simply the elaborate residence for the Middleton family and their descendants. It was a working plantation and as such, had a rather extensive section dedicated to the various activities that would need to take place in order to maintain the grounds and produce some of the food for the family. This included a carriage house, textiles shop, blacksmith shop and a coopering shop. In the latter, an old guy was actually demonstrating how wooden barrels were made back in the day. I found the two man lathe the most interesting. One man would spin a five foot tall wheel that, thru a large belt, would drive the spindle so the other person could do the lathe work.

Cart and Carriage

Coopering Shop

Throughout the course of the day, there are numerous volunteer led talks or tours that are included with our admission. One was a rather honest discussion of how integral slavery was to the creation and upkeep of this plantation. Another tour took us thru the stable and animal paddocks. Our tour guide was quite knowledgeable about the various animals that reside on the plantation today as well as what would have been here centuries ago. There were lots of chickens, geese and other fowl wandering the grounds. And of course there were pig, horses and cattle. One of the older cows had been brought out of its pasture to be milked. Several of the younger visitors waited their turn to try milking her.

Guineafowl

Sleeping Pig

Young Visitor Helps to Milk Cow

Farmhand Finishes the Job

There were also lots of sheep and goats - Chris’ favorite. One of the sheep had very recently given birth to a couple of lambs. They were content to stay inside one of the small shelters while we were there.

Sheep Look to be Recently Sheered

Standing in Lunch

Curvy Horns

Two Lambs with Mom

Goat Comes Over to Our Tour Group

Later in the day, we did a guided walk by another volunteer thru the gardens. There were quite a few plants flowering but the most prevalent were the numerous varieties of camellias. Many of them were past their peak but there were plenty that were still blooming or just starting to open their buds.

We were starting to get tired from all the slow walking around the plantation. As the day wore on, the crowds thinned out and I was able to get a better picture of the beautiful Butterfly Lakes and Sundial Garden. We ended up spending nearly 5 hours at Middleton Place. It’s a neat place to see but it will wear you out taking in all there is to see and do.

Octagonal Garden

Butterfly Lakes

Statue in Secret Garden

The following day was our excursion into Charleston. Chris had found several self guided walking tours and we had downloaded them onto our phones so we could check out the town without getting lost. Charleston also has several free shuttle bus routes that go thru different parts of town. Since all the shuttles seem to run past the visitor center, we head to the parking garage next door. As we walked out of the garage and went to cross the street into the visitor center, Chris’ foot slipped on a handicapped curb and twisted her ankle. We were just about ready to concede this walking tour wasn’t going to happen. After sitting for a bit and stretching her ankle out, she decided we could try a modified version of our tour.

We started by taking the #211 shuttle south. There is a good app that tells us the location of buses so we knew we only had 10 minutes or so before it arrived. It took us nearly that long just to identify where the free shuttle stops are versus the normal bus stops. We got off at Broad Street near Washington Park. That bus ride saved Chris’ ankle just over a mile of walking.

We meandered around the area and generally headed east to get to the waterfront along the Cooper River. There is an immense amount of history in Charleston. We stopped to try a few caches along the way. Some were physical containers but more of them were virtual caches or EarthCaches where we only need to look for information at various historic buildings. The EarthCache had us looking for damage that occurred during the earthquake of 1886. It was interesting to walk several blocks paying attention to signs of repaired brick or stone work. I suspect most people don’t even realize this area is an active seismic zone - I know we didn’t before reading about it.

Possible Repair from 1886 Earthquake?

Homes Along "Rainbow Row"

Chris was doing reasonably well with her ankle, so when we made it to the waterfront, we continued south to point known as “The Battery”. It was a beautiful day. There are lots of statues, monuments and wonderful old buildings.

Almost a Beach

Big Beautiful Home

Horse Drawn Carriage Tour

Statue at The Battery

Instead of pushing our luck with her ankle, we turned around at the tip of the peninsula and headed back north. We stayed right along the river so we could get in some new sights along the way. Our destination was an area known as “The Market”. We suspected we could find someplace for lunch which was good since we were both getting hungry.

Decorated for Easter

Another Carriage Tour

Cobblestone Road

Arthur Ravenel Jr Bridge

Fort Sumter in Distance

Ornate Fountain

After walking a few blocks, we found a place called TBonz Gill and Grill. It sounded good and didn’t look exceptionally busy. After enjoying a good lunch, Chris decided she could continue our walk back to the visitor center parking lot instead of finding the shuttle bus stop. We headed thru the area known as “The French Quarter” on our way north. We eventually made it back to the car and headed back to camp. We in no way saw all there was to see, but we did get a good taste of Charleston.

Overflowing Window Boxes

Large Steeple