Traveling as Two - Hamlet

Today was our last full day in the Carolinas. We packed up and checked out of Garden City and headed toward Charlotte. It was drizzly and wet.

We still hadn't decided if we wanted to get all the way to Charlotte or find a hotel somewhere on the way. It was amazing to me how much greener things were after just a little rain.

My sweetie was looking for a good place to stop when we ran across Hamlet, North Carolina. They had several train museums there.

We started with the actual train cars. My sweetie always wanted to be an engineer...

Then we went across the street to the depot. It was still active for Amtrak and trains came through twice a day.

They had a fantastic little museum in there!

Then we crossed back to the Tornado building for more exhibits.

You know the best part? All of these museums were free!!

We only made one more stop for lunch and we felt so good that my sweetie drove us the rest of the way to Charlotte.

Time to fly tomorrow.

Traveling as Two - Packing Up

It's almost time to go home so we spent the day packing and trying to eat up everything in the condo.

Just after lunch, we decided to take a walk down to the beach.

It was only about a block from the condo.

It was a warm, beautiful day.

As much as we love it here, we are excited to be going home. 

Traveling as Two - Boone Hall Plantation

We only had one plan today, Boone Hall Plantation. Do you recognize the driveway with the oak trees? These pics almost don't seem real, and I took them!!

Our first tour was the main house. It was beautiful, but no pics inside.

Then we took some pics by the water. The trees are just so beautiful...

Then we hiked across the massive lawn to catch the wagon ride.

The wagon ride took us all around the plantation.

Finally, we walked through the little homes of the slaves and toured the dock house.

Our last stop was the Gullah house where we enjoyed a little presentation.

We stopped at a huge mexican place not far from the plantation called Sol for lunch.

Then it was back to the condo in Garden City for another beautiful sunset.

Traveling as Two - Charleston

So glad we aren't in Utah!! They are heading into a 2nd Snow Day with nearly 2 feet on the valley floor. 

Here is Charleston we enjoyed 77 and t-shirts although it wasn't quite that warm as we headed downtown for our first adventure.

The sky was actually gray and angry, but by the time we got downtown,  it was all blue skies. Our first stop was the Fort Sumter Memorial.

I really didn't know anything about the fort or why it was important to our country, I just knew it had something to do with the Civil War, but it was much more than that.

After we had wandered through the museum, we headed for the dock.

We were getting on a ferry that would take us out to the middle of the bay so we could tour the actual Fort Sumter.

It took almost half an hour to get out to the island.

My sweetie loved the cannons.

I loved watching them raise the flag.

It was not our typical flag. I wish I had taken more pics, but I forgot to charge my phone.

I couldn’t resist grabbing a pic of this cargo ship heavy with containers. 

The trip back was uneventful, but it took us forever to get out of the parking garage. That left us only 45 minutes to get lunch. One of the attendants suggested we try The Cru. 

The food was amazing!

We got to our carriage ride just in time.

I was super excited to take a wagon tour around the historic part of old Charleston.

Our gude was awesome and we really enjoyed the tour,

but by the time we were finished, we were exhausted and we went back to the hotel to relax.

But before the night was over, my sweetie wanted to drive the bridge with the lights on.

More fun pics and back to Garden City tomorrow...after a stop or two...