Thursday, June 25, 2015
We were up early to grab breakfast before our 9:00 "Trot & Walk" tour.
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| At the corner cafe we had complimentary beignets (I think we called these doughboys back home) before our breakfast arrived |
On our tour, first we would "trot" with the horse pulling our carriage through the streets of town, then we would walk with our same guide along streets we had not trotted through. We learned a lot of history and saw much of Charleston.
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| Horses get ready to work |
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| Our horse "Facebook" awaits our boarding |
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| Facebook knows the route quite well, and with the help of our guide, Graham, we meander down historic streets |
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| The Anglican Church -- which leans three degrees |
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| The leaning church of Charleston |
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| Dock Street Theatre continues to offer stage plays |
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| Ornate frontage of the Dock Street Theatre |
There are several "cobble stone" streets in Charleston. There is no stone in Charleston so whatever is here has to be brought in. These old streets are made of stone that had been used as ballast for the old ships that came into port.
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| Being in Charleston brings the reality of how it was "back then", and with it comes some sadness about that era |
Near the water there are homes that have been refurbished and are painted in many colors. The street is known as Rainbow Row.
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| Hard to get a good shot of the colorful houses |
We walked along what is know as the "sea wall" that makes a promenade for us.
As part of the city "code", all shutters on houses must be in working order. This to preserve the authenticity of the city. The house in the next photo shows two kinds of shutters. The lower floor has "batten" shutters to protect the inside from, dust, dirt and other debris from the street. The upper floors have "vent" shutters that allow air flow when the are ... shut. If you can enlarge the photo (some of you on iPad can), you will see a "rope" carving around the entry doorway. This indicates that the resident is or was a sea captain.
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| Batten & Vent shutters |
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| Couldn't resist this pink house |
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| Those round plates on the wall of the building are earthquake "screws" (for lack of a better word) |
Those plates are attached to a rod that goes under the floor all the way to the other side of the building. Each year they turn these plates something like a tenth of a turn to keep them tightened "enough". Somehow this helps protect the building from imploding in an earthquake. Charleston had a 7.3 earthquake some time in the 1800s (I think), and now takes precautions against damage from another one happening.
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| A little house amongst the big |
A full day with a lot of history! But, we had one more tour to do.
After dinner we joined a "Ghost Tour" with a walk down alleyways and along graveyards, and stories about duels, suicides, unexplained sightings of "dead" people, and long ago pirate looting and killings.
Tomorrow's agenda is yet to be decided. We are about ten blocks from where Roof shot and killed nine people in the church a week ago. Tomorrow President Obama is arriving for one of the funerals. Streets and many attractions will be closed for the day. Though this adds a little disappointment for us to miss an attraction or two, both Susan and I are in agreement with the city basically closing down in honor of those lost, and our little inconvenience seems a way of participating in that honoring.
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