It was another beautiful morning – partly cloudy, warm, little breeze. We were looking forward to getting into Charleston to have the whole day for a tour of the city. We were up early and on our way by 7 am to cover the six miles against the current and make it to the bascule bridge just outside of Charleston in time for the 9 am opening. And, we should have made it – but Maureen missed the cut and we went a little out of our way before she realized that the trip was taking much longer than expected and she was no longer seeing the little yellow stickers on the channel markers that indicate one is in the ICW. Our path was taking us out to the Atlantic rather than into Charleston Harbor! Oh well, an extra hour of sightseeing on this beautiful waterway and admiring the impressive southern style mansions along the way was time well spent.
By 11 am, we were settled into our slip alongside the “Megadock” at the Charleston City Marina where we enjoyed a fantastic view of the city. After showering and a light lunch, we hopped on the marina’s complimentary shuttle and headed to the Visitors Center where we took a ride on a small tour bus driven by a very knowledgeable and pleasant guide. Susan, our guide, painted a very vivid picture of the City’s origin and history. The buildings and mansions were quite interesting to see. We even experienced a guided tour of one of the older mansions in the city, the Joseph Manigault house built in 1803, which was hosted by a very genteel and petite southern belle. After the tour we walked back to the Visitors Center to catch the last showing of the day of a 38-minute film on Charleston’s history.
By the time the film was finished it was after 5 pm. We decided to walk back to the marina and find a nice restaurant along the way to share an entrée and have a cocktail. We stumbled upon Sermet’s Corner and savored a lovely meal of parmesan and pepper encrusted salmon over the special mashed potatoes and steamed vegetables. It was fantastic!! After dinner, we began our stroll back to the marina. As luck would have it, we saw the marina shuttle just pulling out of a parking lot about two blocks into our walk and caught a ride back. We were glad for the ride as it turned out to be a much longer walk than we had thought!!
Back on Blue Heron, we sat out on the foredeck to enjoy the cool breezes after the sun went down.
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