Historic Charleston

The first free weekend in Charleston, everyone but myself and Jim were back in the PNW... What to do first?
Of course, one of the things that Charleston is most famous for is the first shot of the civil war, which was fired on union troops in Ft Sumter in Charleston harbor. The Cold War bunker in the middle of the fort was a bit of a surprise, but it housed a very neat little museum. The mortar foundation awed my civil engineering self with its sheer mass. Today, the guns were quiet.

We walked back down East Bay street and took in a little Colonial history at the Old Exchange building. Costumed historians filled us in on its history. George Washington danced there, the Redcoats used it as a prison, and remains from the old fortified city wall are still in the basement. We wandered around south of Broad and through the market... History aside, Charleston really is a charming city.

"In walking about Charleston, I was forcibly reminded of some of the older country towns in England. The appearance of the city is highly picturesque...It has none of the smug mercantile primness of the Northern cities, but a look of state...a little gone down in the world, yet remembering still its former dignity...Charleston has an air of eccentricity, too and peculiarity, which formerly were not deemed unbecoming..." British actress Frances Ann Kemble, 1839