Charleston

We're winding up a week in Charleston, South Carolina.  If you have never been here, it is worth a long weekend.  It is a beautiful city, with houses from the 1730s through the 1850s beautifully preserved throughout downtown.  It is a very walkable city, but don't come in the summer.  The highs have been in the 90s all week and the humidity is so high the weather service issued health alerts yesterday and today because the heat index (temperature plus humidity) is 105 - 110 degrees.

Charleston maintained its lovely housing stock because it was so poor after the war (that would be the War of Northern Aggression, aka the Civil War for those of you not from the South) that folks couldn't afford to tear down and replace their aging homes.  By the time the economy began to recover (WWII), the historical society was fully established and fought hard to require folks to repair, not replace, the historic homes.  Even when it wasn't possible to save a house, the building regulations required replacement with architecturally consistent buildings.  There are a few unfortunate 1960s high rises, but not many.  The Charleston water front is particularly attractive because it is almost completely antebellum homes.  We'll try to get a photo when we leave tomorrow morning.

The homes evolved over time to what is now considered a "typical" Charleston architectural style.  In this picture you see the three story original home built in the 1760s on the left.  The porches and the front door were added by a later owner in the 1840s.  The picture below shows what the porches typically look like behind the door.  Ironically, by insisting on re-furbishing these houses, the historical society also preserved the re-sale values of these houses. One of these charming antiques will run you more than $1 million in the center of the city and over $2 million on the southern tip of the peninsula.  I can't even imagine the annual maintenance costs.

Charleston also has a nice downtown shopping district and great, albeit expensive, restaurants.We treated ourselves to two dinners out, at Magnolias and the Charleston Grill.  There must be another 20-25 equally good places to eat that we didn't have time to try. We're considering coming back here for the winter, but I worry that we would be both broke and fat before we headed north again in the Spring.  

The local craft is baskets made from sea grass, a traditional craft of the Gullah,  African Americans who live in the Low Country region of South Carolina.  The Gullah are known for preserving more of their African linguistic and cultural heritage than any other African American community in the United States.  This was possible because the rice plantations of South Carolina were out in the country, but the planters and their families usually lived in town, specifically in Charleston.  So the African slaves were more able to maintain their own culture.  The baskets are beautiful, but too expensive for me.  A simple 8 inch basket is $80. We looked but did not buy.  My $10 palm frond baskets from Key West continue to function just fine.

When we leave tomorrow we will have guests on board.  Dave and Judi Nofs, friends we met when we went sailing in the early '90s, are driving up from Sarasota to join us for a week.  They will be with us until we get to Oriental, North Carolina.  In Oriental we'll be staying with Pat and Almira Dallas on the dock at their house.  Pat and Almira, Dave and Judi, and Jim and I all sailed together for several months in the Bahamas in 1991.  We're looking forward to the opportunity to catch up with Dave and Judi.  Then at the end of this week, Rob and Carol Harris and their dog Franklin are joining us in Oriental for a couple of days.  Busy times on Down Time. But note that guests are welcome and encouraged.  If you'd like a little boating adventure, please let us know.  We love company.