The Carolinas

After leaving Virginia, we drove to the Golden Triangle of North Carolina.

Our trip here had one major objective, and this was it. It had been far too long since we had seen our niece Lauren.

Lauren was recently awarded her Master's in Environmental Science, and is now on the staff at Duke. She is very bright, and very involved in a fascinating program designed to characterize the effects of global warming on forest community structure. Ted, the biologist, had a great time talking with her and swapping war stories.
Lauren suggested that we meet at a local restaurant, The Magnolia Grill. They're famous for combining seemingly incompatible flavors and coming up with something wonderful. We had, perhaps, the best meals we've had this year. These desserts were too beautifully presented to snarf without at least taking a photograph.
Almost everywhere you drive there are these little roads that seem to invite you to follow them for a while. This may be a place we will have to return to take advantage of a few more of them.From there, we went to Charleston. As we drove in, we saw many of these little roadside stands selling"sweetgrass" baskets. They are made by techniques brought from Africa by early African-American slaves. They were extensively used by residents of Gullah Island to hand-separate rice from husks. As the name implies, they are made primarily with a local grass called sweetgrass, also known as purple muehly. These baskets are true works of art, and carry prices that reflect that. I'm talking $250 for a bread basket!
This is the view we had from our front window. A large live-oak tree covered with Spanish Moss extended over our campsite. The upside was that it was beautiful and shaded. The downside was an almost constant rain of ripe nuts on top of our coach. Unfortunately we came down with some form of creeping crud while we were here, and didn't get to take full advantage of the area. If we had to be sick, however, this was a nice place to sit and heal.

We did, however, recover well enough to spend at least one afternoon in Charleston. On the way in, we passed a fire station with this whimsical casting outside.

There was block after block of these neat old homes on the riverfront.

This is South Battery Street. To the right is White Point Garden. It is filled with beautiful big willow-leaf live-oaks covered with Spanish moss. True to the state nickname, there were palmettos everywhere.

This is the Charleston customs house. Construction was began in 1855, but funds began to dry up as it became apparent that South Carolina was about to secede. It was completed after the conclusion of the Civil War.

We wish we had felt better, we feel that we gave Charleston short shrift, but since the next move was to Savannah, we were eager to get on the road.