Day 103 - Another Charming Low Country Town

We had to return the rental car downtown Charleston before making our way to Georgetown, SC.  After we dropped it off, we continued to walk down Meeting Street and ran into a Farmer’s Market and craft show.  It was the usual fresh produce, baked goods, seafood, jewelry, and other handmade items.  One unique feature was an African Dance group, complete with drums.  At Market Street, we wandered into the Charleston Market before boarding the resort shuttle at Sweet CeCe’s Ice Cream Parlor for a ride back to the marina.

By 11:00 am the Captain backed out of the slip and entered the harbor.  On our port was Isle of Palms, where we had eaten the night before, and Fort Moultrie.   We followed the channel out to the Atlantic, which was rougher than expected with 3 foot waves and lots of whitewater.  The boat pounded right into the waves for the next  3.5 hours, with spray spewing over the hardtop.  The shore is lined with homes all the way to McClellanville, then sandy beaches from there to the Georgetown inlet at Winyah Bay.  Before entering the inlet, we passed Cape Romain, marked with a lighthouse.  From the inlet we rejoined the ICW briefly at the Waccamaw River, then veered off into the Sampit River to Harborwalk Marina in Georgetown.   It was 3:30 pm by the time we docked due to the rough water.

 

 

Georgetown is South Carolina’s third oldest city, founded in 1729 as a port.  Rice and indigo plantations were established along the waterways here, later replaced by lumber and turpentine.  By the 1840s, this area produced half of the rice consumed in the US.  The entire downtown is a National Historic District and there are several small museums, including one dedicated to rice.  Unfortunately, we arrived too late to tour the museums, but did manage to find a few shops that were open.  The city built a harborwalk along the Sampit River side of the buildings on historical Front Street and we strolled the boardwalk, enjoying a beautiful afternoon.  We sat down at the outdoor bar at The Big Tuna and had cool drinks and appetizers.

We walked back past the harbor to the shrimp docks and went into Independent Seafood just before they closed.  There we bought 2 lbs. of fresh jumbo shrimp (head, eyes and all) caught that day, shrimp and crab dips, a boil mix for the shrimp, and a couple of seafood sauces.   What a seafood feast we had that night, sampling the dips with crackers and boiling, then chilling the shrimp.   Not so enjoyable was watching the Blackhawks lose another game to the LA Kings.  Let’s GO Hawks!!