Extra, extra: read all about it! B tours Charleston, has fun and mishaps
Basically 90% of South Carolina (forgive me in advance if any of you reading are from South Carolina) is armpit. Hot, sweaty, smelly, gross, and no place I want to visit. This was mostly not true of Charleston.
It was still hot and sweaty and occasionally smelly. But it was mostly awesome.
We alternated between awesome things and lame things. The first awesome thing was that our house was pretty new, with a ridiculous gourmet kitchen and granite counter tops. The first lame thing was one of the guys--thankfully not mine--got stung by a jellyfish his first time out in the water on the first day. It was pretty gnarly.
On the second day, lame thing the second: I HAD A TICK ON MY BACK. Only I can come to the beach and get bitten by a tick. Dave saw him right on my back and pulled him off. It was horrible and gross and thank fuck that a) he hadn't been there long (because he was still tiny, Dave said) and b) I never even had to see him. I HATE BUGS, AND ONE WAS ATTACHED TO ME. FUUUUUUUUUCK.
Awesome thing #2: our day trip into Charleston. We wandered the downtown open-air markets, and I saw so much cool stuff (and maybe bought nightanddaze something for her WFD?) before deciding to take a carriage tour through the historic district.
They do the tours by lottery, because there are over 90 blocks of historic Charleston, and each tour can only cover 30. By pure luck (and probably due to the earlier misfortune with the jellyfish) we got the Battery tour, which is the beautiful area by the water, with the biggest most amazing houses and the most Civil War (and therefore interesting) history. The highlight?
That, my friends, is Stephen Colbert's childhood home. When the tour guide pointed it out, most of the other tourists could care less. I was like "Ooh!!!" and proceeded to snap 18 pictures. We were in the last row of the carriage so I just kept snapping, since there was nothing and no one in my way. Dave had to take the camera away. I am a huge dork. Anyway, the tour was awesome, our guide was incredible, and I learned that our carriage was pulled by mules, which are the product of a donkey and a draft horse and are always sterile. I guess it's kinda like when you breed a lion and a tiger and get a LIGER. I assume those are sterile, too.
We ate in downtown Charleston that night, and the food was amaaaaazing. I had three extremely excelsior Cosmopolitans (that bartender was magic) and while I was noshing on some soft white bread, the third lame thing happened: I LOST A FILLING! A big one, from my lower molar, that had to be at least 11 years old. It was pretty impossible to eat until I got some temporary filling from the drug store. Which I still have. There's, like, a big hole in the back of my mouth and it feels so weird when I chew. Seriously.
The last awesome thing we did was visit Middleton Place, an old plantation outside of Charleston (technically in Summerville, where I have family who can NEVER KNOW I was in their town and didn't visit them). It was pretty cool, except it was the hottest day yet and we were all so hot by the end of it that we were dizzy and weak and miserable. We couldn't take any pictures inside the plantation house, which had some pretty cool political/historical/war memorabilia (apparently every generation of Middleton Place inhabitants was involved in the politics of their day, including one Declaration signer and one signer of the Confederate secession). But before we did the house tour, we did another carriage ride, this one with real horses.
These guys were descendants of Belgian draft horses. The darker one was actually European, the blond was American, as were the other 6 of the 8-horse stable. They had two of them pulling our 12-person-plus-one-driver carriage, but one of them could have managed it. (Seriously, these guys could have pulled a bus.) They use two just to make the load easier. Plus it was really hot for one guy to be doing all that work. Even if he could.
We went out to eat the last night in our little beach town, at a place that was reportedly famous for it's unusual and sloppily delicious burgers. They had one that was pimento cheese and bacon, but I was not that brave. Mine was jalapeno and cheddar, spicy and ridiculously bad for you. It was pretty damn good. Amusingly, I was the only one to order a burger.
TL;DR I had a good time in Charleston and I got a little bit of a tan. We ate a lot of good food and saw some cool things, including Stephen Colbert's childhood home. (I WAS THRILLED, YOU GUYS.)
On a completely different note: LAST NIGHT'S TRUE BLOOD. I didn't even know what to think most of the time. SO MUCH CRYING. SO MUCH NUDITY. SO MUCH BOYKISSING. I think I died. TALK TO ME ABOUT THIS, BEFORE MY HEAD EXPLODES.
My groin is still pulled. WTF, Y'ALL.
It was still hot and sweaty and occasionally smelly. But it was mostly awesome.
We alternated between awesome things and lame things. The first awesome thing was that our house was pretty new, with a ridiculous gourmet kitchen and granite counter tops. The first lame thing was one of the guys--thankfully not mine--got stung by a jellyfish his first time out in the water on the first day. It was pretty gnarly.
On the second day, lame thing the second: I HAD A TICK ON MY BACK. Only I can come to the beach and get bitten by a tick. Dave saw him right on my back and pulled him off. It was horrible and gross and thank fuck that a) he hadn't been there long (because he was still tiny, Dave said) and b) I never even had to see him. I HATE BUGS, AND ONE WAS ATTACHED TO ME. FUUUUUUUUUCK.
Awesome thing #2: our day trip into Charleston. We wandered the downtown open-air markets, and I saw so much cool stuff (and maybe bought nightanddaze something for her WFD?) before deciding to take a carriage tour through the historic district.
They do the tours by lottery, because there are over 90 blocks of historic Charleston, and each tour can only cover 30. By pure luck (and probably due to the earlier misfortune with the jellyfish) we got the Battery tour, which is the beautiful area by the water, with the biggest most amazing houses and the most Civil War (and therefore interesting) history. The highlight?
That, my friends, is Stephen Colbert's childhood home. When the tour guide pointed it out, most of the other tourists could care less. I was like "Ooh!!!" and proceeded to snap 18 pictures. We were in the last row of the carriage so I just kept snapping, since there was nothing and no one in my way. Dave had to take the camera away. I am a huge dork. Anyway, the tour was awesome, our guide was incredible, and I learned that our carriage was pulled by mules, which are the product of a donkey and a draft horse and are always sterile. I guess it's kinda like when you breed a lion and a tiger and get a LIGER. I assume those are sterile, too.
We ate in downtown Charleston that night, and the food was amaaaaazing. I had three extremely excelsior Cosmopolitans (that bartender was magic) and while I was noshing on some soft white bread, the third lame thing happened: I LOST A FILLING! A big one, from my lower molar, that had to be at least 11 years old. It was pretty impossible to eat until I got some temporary filling from the drug store. Which I still have. There's, like, a big hole in the back of my mouth and it feels so weird when I chew. Seriously.
The last awesome thing we did was visit Middleton Place, an old plantation outside of Charleston (technically in Summerville, where I have family who can NEVER KNOW I was in their town and didn't visit them). It was pretty cool, except it was the hottest day yet and we were all so hot by the end of it that we were dizzy and weak and miserable. We couldn't take any pictures inside the plantation house, which had some pretty cool political/historical/war memorabilia (apparently every generation of Middleton Place inhabitants was involved in the politics of their day, including one Declaration signer and one signer of the Confederate secession). But before we did the house tour, we did another carriage ride, this one with real horses.
These guys were descendants of Belgian draft horses. The darker one was actually European, the blond was American, as were the other 6 of the 8-horse stable. They had two of them pulling our 12-person-plus-one-driver carriage, but one of them could have managed it. (Seriously, these guys could have pulled a bus.) They use two just to make the load easier. Plus it was really hot for one guy to be doing all that work. Even if he could.
We went out to eat the last night in our little beach town, at a place that was reportedly famous for it's unusual and sloppily delicious burgers. They had one that was pimento cheese and bacon, but I was not that brave. Mine was jalapeno and cheddar, spicy and ridiculously bad for you. It was pretty damn good. Amusingly, I was the only one to order a burger.
TL;DR I had a good time in Charleston and I got a little bit of a tan. We ate a lot of good food and saw some cool things, including Stephen Colbert's childhood home. (I WAS THRILLED, YOU GUYS.)
On a completely different note: LAST NIGHT'S TRUE BLOOD. I didn't even know what to think most of the time. SO MUCH CRYING. SO MUCH NUDITY. SO MUCH BOYKISSING. I think I died. TALK TO ME ABOUT THIS, BEFORE MY HEAD EXPLODES.
My groin is still pulled. WTF, Y'ALL.