South Carolina--Day 5

September 22, 2011

Our first item on the agenda for this day was to go to Drayton Hall.  I enjoyed touring this plantation because it is pretty much all original.  The paint, the ceilings, the floors have all been maintained to their original state these past several hundred years.  You may notice that there is no furniture in this house.  Why?  Because it is considered a distraction for tourists.  By not having any furniture in the home you are able to fully appreciate the originality of the entire house (I know I did).

Are you familiar with these?  They are called growth sticks (picture courtesy of Google images).

Well the Drayton family decided to keep track of the growth of their children.  The tradition has continued for these past several hundred years and I believe that the current descendants still practice this today.  If you look closely in this picture you will see several pen marks on this wall.  How cool is that?

During our tour of the grounds at Drayton Hall I was busy taking pictures when I suddenly realized that my ankles felt like they were on fire.  Perplexed, I looked down at my feet and saw that I had stepped into a fire ant hill!  It was awful!  I walked away with several ant stings but I would have probably received more if I was wearing my flip flops.  Thank goodness I wore my tennis shoes that day.

After Drayton Hall we all headed back to downtown Charleston for lunch at Petticoats.  Here we met up with my Dad as his convention meetings had ended.  I don't know why, but we didn't take any pictures at lunch.  Oh well.

After lunch we went to visit historic Fort Sumter.  Again, South Carolina is very proud of its history and they are particularly proud with their Civil War history.  That is because the first shots fired in the Civil war took place at Fort Sumter.

Fort Sumter is located in the Charleston Harbor and in order to set foot on the fort you have to take a boat--which I loved because you got to see Charleston from the ocean.  It was so beautiful and the sea air was so refreshing.

 

During our boat ride we had a few visitors come and join us.  If you look closely you'll see that these are dolphins in these pictures--not sharks.  They were so much fun to watch.  I just wish I got better shots of them.  Trying to predict when and where a dolphin would come to the surface was quite hard.  I am pretty proud of these few shots though.

Here are a few shots inside the fort.

It's time for a little compare and contrast again.

This photo was taken in 1993.

And here we are 18 years later.  Yes I know--Mary is not in this photo and I realize that my dad was not in the 1993 photo either.  But it is so much fun to see how much we've changed in the last 18 years.

When we got done with Fort Sumter it was approaching dinner time and we were all getting hungry.  My Mom wanted to treat everybody to dinner that night so we headed over to Blossom Restaurant.  The food was so delicious and it was so much fun.  Thanks Mom for the treat!

After dinner we said a few farewells.  My Dad was leaving early the next morning to go back home, and Eric's family was staying in Charleston for another day.  Nathan and I, along with my Mom and my sisters, Emily and Katherine, were to leave the next morning to head north to Charlotte.  It was sad to say some goodbyes because it meant that our trip in South Carolina was really coming to a close.

Song Pool

Conference greetings to all...

Here are the lists of conference songs for Nathan and I (NO CHEATING TAWNYA--I know your little secret now)!  For our new blog followers click here and things will make a little more sense.

Happy listening.

Rachel's List

1.              #1 The Morning Breaks

2.              #3 Now Let Us Rejoice

3.              #5 High on a Mountain Top

4.              #6 Redeemer of Israel

5.              #15 I Saw a Mighty Angel Fly

6.              #19 We Thank Thee O God for a Prophet

7.              #25 Now We’ll Sing with One Accord

8.              #26 Joseph Smith’s First Prayer

9.              #27 Praise to the Man

10.          #44 Beautiful Zion, Build Above

11.          #58 Come, Ye Children of the Lord

12.          #66 Rejoice, the Lord is King

13.          #67 Glory to God on High

14.          #72 Praise to the Lord, the Almighty

15.          #81 Press, Forward Saints

16.          #83 Guide Us O, Thou Great Jehovah

17.          #85 How Firm A Foundation

18.          #98 I Need Thee Every Hour

19.          #123 Oh, May My Soul Commune with Thee

20.          #125 How Gentle God’s Commands

21.          #134 I Believe in Christ

22.          #142 Sweet Hour of Prayer

23.          #152 God, Be With You Till We Meet Again

24.          #237 Do What is Right

25.          #259 Hope of Israel

26.          #270 I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go

27.          #301 I Am a Child of God

28.          #323 Rise Up, O Men of God

29.          Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing

30.          My Shepherd Will Supply My Need

Nathan's List

1.              #1 The Morning Breaks

2.              #2 The Spirit of God

3.              #3 Now Let Us Rejoice

4.              #5 High on a Mountain Top

5.              #6 Redeemer of Israel

6.              #19 We Thank Thee O God For a Prophet

7.              #23 We Ever Pray For Thee

8.              #26 Joseph Smith’s First Prayer

9.              #27 Praise to the Man

10.          #58 Come Ye Children of the Lord

11.          #66 Rejoice, the Lord is King

12.          #67 Glory to God on High

13.          #72 Praise to the Lord, the Almighty

14.          #83 Guide Us, O Thou Great Jehovah

15.          #85 How Firm a Foundation

16.          #98 I Need Thee Every Hour

17.          #136 I Know that My Redeemer Lives

18.          #156 Sing We Now at Parting

19.          #223 Have I Done any good in the World Today

20.          #249 Called to Serve

21.          #256 As Zion’s Youth in Latter Days

22.          #264 Hark All Ye Nations

23.          #274 The Iron Rod

24.          #277 As I Search the Holy Scriptures

25.          #292 O My Father

26.          #293 Each Life that Touches Ours for Good

27.          #301 I am a Child of God

28.          #305 The Light Divine

29.          #323 Rise Up O Men of God

30.          Consider the Lillies

MOTAB picture courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

South Carolina--Day 4

September 21, 2011

This day we pretty much stayed in Downtown Charleston.  Our first item of business was to do a pirate tour.  When I was researching things to do in Charleston, I came across the pirate tour numerous times and it had great reviews.  So we booked a tour and I must say that many of us were disappointed.  Eric, our tour guide, had loads of information on pirate, but it was really boring.  However, we did capture a few photos to commemorate the dreadful experience.

On the upside, we did manage see some historic buildings during the pirate tour like the Old Slave Mart Museum, St. Philips Church, a cobble stone street, and the Pink House Gallery.

After the pirate tour, my mom wanted to treat us to lunch so we had some regional cuisine at the Cru Cafe.

After lunch we walked down Market street.  I loved this.  It was a flea market in a building about a mile long.

One item that you see a lot in these markets are many handwoven baskets.  They are gorgeous and so neat which also makes them really expensive.  The one Nathan is holding below I believe was $300.

My sister has always wanted one of these since she was a little girl so we walked the market for her to find one--and she did!

After Market Street we did some more walking around in Charleston.

We went to the historic St. Michael's church.

It was in this pew that Princess Diana (with Prince Charles--blah) and a few other famous couples have sat in for worship. 

I took a picture of my sister leading the music in St. Michael's.  

 These headstones are of Charles Cotesworth Pinckney and John Rutledge.  These men were statesman of South Carolina and played an important role in regards to our Nations Constitution.

After St. Michael's church we headed down to East Bay Street to view the historical Rainbow Row.  I love looking at these homes.  I used to love coming here when I was a little girl because at that time I was into the show Rainbow Brite.

I love these little walkways between the homes.  They are so pretty.

After we walked down East Bay Street we started to come up on The Battery.  There are several homes here and they are gorgeous (not to mention very pricey).  The Battery is right up along the Charleston Harbor and therefore were susceptible to damage and ruin during the wars, and also to flooding.

As we continued to walk we made our way to the Nathaniel Russell House.

The tour guide told us that we could not take pictures inside the house, so the two stair case photos are courtesy of Google images.  I love this staircase.  It is so beautiful, and the neat thing about it--it's a free flying staircase!

This is a picture of the drawing room.  But since I couldn't take any pictures during the tour I downloaded this courtesy of Google images.

By this time, the end of the day was drawing near and we were starting to get hungry.  The rest of my siblings went to a restaurant called Moe's, but Nathan and I decided to go out to dinner by ourselves in celebration of our anniversary.  We went to the famous Magnolias restaurant.

Nathan had the pecan chicken with mashed potatoes and asparagus, and I had the buttermilk fried chicken breast with asparagus, biscuits, mashed potatoes, and creamed corn.  Below is a picture of my southern dinner (I forgot to take a picture before I started eating my chicken).

We normally do not eat desserts when we go out to eat, but we wanted to eat some true southern desserts while we were in Charleston for the experience.  Nathan had the peach and blackberry crisp, and I had the southern pecan pie.  YUM!  This is why we ended up gaining about 5-10 pounds on this trip.

After Magnolias, Nathan and I drove around for a while and ended up back in our hotel and watched a little bit of Fraiser (love that show).  Our feet were in a lot of pain because of all the walking we did so we just took it easy before we went to bed.