Final Charleston post

Whoops - I had these photos ready to share and forgot to publish the post! So here, you go - our last day in Charleston was a sunny, windy Saturday. First thing in the morning we drove over the river (out of the downtown) and to the closest beach area, Sullivan's Island. It was AMAZING to see the open expanse of water and sand and smell the salty air. "Jim!" I exclaimed. "We have got to live near the beach someday!" (Afterwards I realized that four of our six combined siblings do indeed live very close to a coast.) I wish we had brought our jackets because it was still very windy; also it would have been nice to have some beach chairs so we could have sat and read our books into the afternoon... Instead we just enjoyed a slow stroll and watched all the dogs running around and a huge cargo ship slowly approaching the port.

took this picture of a stranded jellyfish to show Timo

Afterwards we visited Fort Moultrie on the end of the island (with a view toward Fort Sumter, which you can see over my shoulder in the photo). This fort was in use for the defense of Charleston from the Revolutionary War through World War II, and is now property of the national park system. We didn't even realize what we were getting into when we pulled in to the parking lot - we were just looking for a place to eat our picnic! But in fact it was really interesting to walk around and read & see the history of the fort during each of the wars. And then we sat and looked out to the canal while we happily ate our lunch. Oh, and Ft Moultrie flies a 15 stripe, 15 star flag (used 1795-1818)! Isn't that cool!

Our last evening we took another meandering walk around parts of the historic downtown and along White Point Gardens. We were 'joined' by quite a crowd of tourists, but I suppose that is normal in Charleston, even in February.

A little bit more baby belly to see on my in this photo below... and now, these legs are tired, let's go home for supper, and tomorrow back to Sylva to our boys!