Last week we spent a delightful five days in Kiawah Island, South Carolina. That was our headquarters but we ventured all over the area with two of the days in Charleston and one in Savannah GA. The weather was mostly sunny and low to mid 70's and we just had the best time.
Our back yard!
I laid on that dock for a nice spell one afternoon.
This was the house we stayed in: the first pic was my first glimpse when I got up on morning one right out the back door. The next pic is the front/left side and the last two are the back. It was a lovely place and we had more room than we needed. Kiawah Island is about 35 minutes southeast of Charleston and the private community was perfectly planned in a place that was once just a heavily wooded marshland backed by ocean. It's still woodsy and marshy and the developers really took pains to preserve the flora and fauna. There are several thousand very huge houses (it's like a law - they all have to be huge and wooden and at least three stories) amongst the woods and marshes with boardwalk style bridges connecting little islands to each other to make up Kiawah. And there are five world class golf courses interspersed among all of this plus a gloriously long and wide white sand beach, at least a dozen miles long. We saw many alligators in yards and ponds, lots of local deer and fabulous egrets, ibis, and blue herons hanging out wherever there was water. Biking and walking trails also line the roads and it's just a wonderful place to experience and for the residents, to live. We saw teens cruising boats and fishing down the waterways like the one out our back yard. I thought to myself that if I were a kid again, it would be a wonderland for the kind of stuff I used to love to do. I'd never be indoors, that's for sure.
A neighborhood alligator in a pond in someone's yard down our street.
Above and below: examples of the bridges that span the water ways and connect little pieces of the island. Local folk biking.
And there they were above and below proving the signs correct. They totally ignored us as we walked near them and snapped pictures. One day when I was taking a walk near our house here, I heard a thrashing sound in the woods which had water throughout and I imagined an alligator might be running out to me but thankfully it was just a deer.
This golf course runs along the ocean and we ate our first dinner at the restaurant where I took this pic.
On day two we explored Charleston. What a charming town! We parked our car and just walked for blocks and blocks gawking at the gorgeous old houses with their unique side porches and pocket gardens and of course we sought out the bakeries, five of them in fact.
Bakery number one - Sugar.
Number two - Five Loaves; we ate lunch here and it was super delish.
This bakery was tiny, like a coffee house with piles cookies, bars and pastries and we voted theirs
the tastiest.
Some of our loot!
I just took a little bite of each thing we bought and we ate from this box over the course of the whole week.
We went to the Redux Art Center downtown and I got to visit the studio of one of my current favorite artists, Luli Wallace. She was home with a new baby but her assistant let us look at her works and take pictures and ask lots of questions.
The Redux Contemporary Art Center above. Artists come here to work in rented studios instead of working at home. We poked our heads in several of the studies and perused art hanging in the gallery.
Queen Street is a very long street where all the best shopping is done. This picture and any others I took don't do justice to what a pretty road it is and how unique every store front or building is.
Art from one of the other artists at Redux who was also missing from his studio. I loved his technique here.
Really cool street and building where we had dinner - McCrady's. Amazing food but tiny portions. That's okay, we had a box of pastries in the car.
The day after our thorough exploration of Charleston proper, we went back to the area to see both Folly Beach (kind of like our Hampton Beach scene but a way longer beach) on one side of the city and Isle of Palms on the other; Isle of Palms is lined with very upscale homes, fewer touristy places but the same type of long, powdery, lovely beach. And in between the two beaches, we went to one of the oldest plantations in the South, Magnolia Plantation, north of the city. Wow, what an experience! We spent our hours there walking through the acres of gardens and crossing the many ponds and various colored bridges. It's like the American version of Monet's Giverny. Azaleas and Camellias were blooming their hearts out to be followed for months by all sorts of other flowers, trees and shrubs - it was so gorgeous.
Across this water way are acres of rice fields that are still farmed at the plantation. You can't see them but they were there.
You can see some of the rice fields way in the distance across the pond and water way here in this pic.
I loved the spanish moss that hangs on all the live oak trees. As a matter of fact, I just adore live oak trees!
The plantation house. We didn't go in the house or in the slave cabins; we chose instead the gardens and swamps to leave time to go to Charleston beaches.
Here we are walking through swamps but thankfully on boardwalks built for several miles. The bird life was amazing to watch. That green coating lies thickly on top of the swamp.
Bird watching at the swamp area. There were hundreds of beautiful birds all over the place - such a joy to watch.
We ate dinner back in Charleston at this deliciously pink place. Below are examples of the side porches on all the Charleston houses.
The next day we headed 2.5 hours to Savannah Georgia. Another really lovely city with 22 squares situated every few blocks and we walked to them all! And just one bakery. The other one on our list was sold out of all the good stuff we were interested in.
Look at these live oak trees in this square! This is typical of how they all looked; shady, tidy, paths and benches.
The interior of Back In The Day Bakery. I left Dan at Forsythe Park and walked (ran) about 12 blocks to get to this place. Friend Amy E and Dan's daughter Brooke told us we had to check it out.
The goods were worth the run! Two kinds of brownies, lavender shortbread, donut muffin and chocolate chip cookies. Everything was excellent.
Another square
Along the river walk.
The rest of our time in the Low Country was spent on Kiawah where we walked the beaches, drove every path and road, ate lots of shrimp and fish (I ate fish every day of this vacation!), had a little spa time getting pampered, a tiny bit of time in our heated pool, etc. On our way to the airport to fly back home, we drove to the Angel Tree, what is thought to be the oldest live oak tree in the world, about 1500 years old. It has lost some of its top growth so it's only 60 or so feet tall but some of the branches go out about 160 feet and eight people joining outstretched hands can span the trunk. Here it is below as I took the pic through the fence early in the morning. The gate was closed so this was the best I could do and I certainly couldn't get the whole of the tree in the frame, dang it. It is open from 9-5 (we were there earlier) and free admission. What a sight!
We loved the Low Country!!!
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