I just got back from one of the best mini vacations I’ve
ever taken. My friend Jordan had asked
me a few months back how I wanted to live out my last single days, and I had
mentioned taking a trip. As the mom of an 18-month-old, she was totally on
board! I picked Charleston, South
Carolina since I had never been before but had always wanted to go.
Y’all, it was amazing!
I can’t wait for my husband to take me back there someday. (hint, hint –
Milton) For the record, I probably won’t be using
y’all outside this post. I just wanted
to feel like a real Charlestonian for a minute, but I can tell it doesn’t suit
me.
Jordan and I go way back….all the way to law school. Together, we ran the Christian Legal Society,
and made it the world-renowned organization it is today. Well, more like we managed to keep it going
and not publicly embarrass ourselves or the Lord in the process. We also ran an
ill advised half marathon one time, but we won’t talk about that. Now that
we’re getting older and she’s married with babies to tend to, we don’t get to
see each other as often as we’d like. It
doesn’t help that we live 9 hours apart.
It was a wonder we could find 3 consecutive days to spend in the same
city, but I’m so glad we did.
We arrived at Charleston around 11:30pm. Neither of us had bothered to rent a car, but
we weren’t concerned. We figured we’d
just see what the Charleston airport had to offer us. What we found was an unhelpful woman at the
Hertz booth who only catered to those with a reservation. We had slightly better luck with Avis, but
they wanted $800 to rent an SUV for 3 days.
When the woman gave us the total – “that will be $798.89” – Jordan
looked at me and said, “you want to go ahead and do it?” I think my response was something like,
“Point me in the direction of the hotel.
I’ll walk.” What surprised me
more was her willingness to part with almost $1000 for a rental car. The Jordan I knew only spent money under
extreme duress. Turns out she thought
that the woman had meant $7.98 per day.
What a bargain. Did I mention it was 11:30 at night, and Jordan is
preggo? Suddenly it all makes
sense.
With the ring of $800 in the air, I moved us down the line to
a portly gentleman working the all but abandoned National desk. Finally, a
Southern gentleman. He rented us a beautiful Toyota Camry for $90. We took in the sights, at least what we could
see by moonlight, on our 20 minute trek to the boutique hotel Jordan had picked
out for us. There just happened to be an
empty parking space directly in front of the hotel. We were amazed. It turns out Charleston is pretty magical,
and this kind of good fortune would follow us for the entire trip…mostly.
The night duty concierge let us in and showed us to our
room. It was beautiful and not at all
cheesy for a beach-themed area. The most
important thing she taught us was how to order breakfast. We knew it was included with the room, but we
were expecting a pitiful fruit and bagel tray in the lobby. But, Charleston is magical. You actually got to custom order your
breakfast from a plethora of options (many of them Weight Watcher’s friendly)
and then they would deliver it to your room at the time you specified.
Seriously.
We had the best time picking and choosing from all the
options. In case any of you ever decide
to check out the Harbor View Inn, please note that the ½ grapefruit option
under the juice menu literally means a half grapefruit and not just a small
glass of grapefruit juice, as we had foolishly assumed.
We slept in until 9am when our breakfast arrived, and then
we headed out for a walking tour I had scheduled. This was a bit of a shot in the dark, but I
wanted to see some of the historical places in downtown Charleston and thought
a walking tour might be enjoyable. I
hadn’t factored in that Charleston is super humid, it was August, and Jordan is
5 months pregnant. I found a listing for
Two Sister’s Tours through trip advisor and thought it was right up our
alley. The business is run by two
sisters (duh) who have lived in Charleston their whole lives. They give tours twice a day for $20 a person
in groups of 20 or less. Our particular
tour had 7 people on it, which ended up being pretty perfect. It turns out the sisters are both retired
attorneys! Mary Helen gave our tour that
morning, and she was delightful.
The tour ended up being exactly what I was looking for. We got to traipse through all these little
neighborhoods and side streets to look at period homes and gardens, sprinkled
with stops at historic sites and buildings dating from the early 1700s. In
addition, we got wonderful restaurant and plantation recommendations from the
sister. I highly recommend this tour if
you’re ever in Charleston. I’ve already decided to go again on my next trip.
One of the last stops we made on the tour was to “the oldest theater in
America.”* The Dock Street Theater is a beautiful old playhouse dating back
from the 1700s. It has been completely
restored in the last few years and now serves as a performance venue for
Charleston Stage, a local theater group.
As luck would have it, they were opening a new production that evening
of the musical The Producers. Jordan and
I decided on a whim to get tickets for that evening. While The Producers is a bit risqué in terms
of content, we both thoroughly enjoyed the evening.
As we walked back to our hotel after the performance, we
kept passing groups of semi-sober ladies wearing princess crowns, feather boas,
and matching t-shirts saying things like “bride to be” and “blame it on the
vodka.” Jordan lamented that she hadn’t
thought to do something similarly tacky for me. She wondered if my bachelorette weekend was
too tame to be a proper send-off. As we
stopped at a hip restaurant for a late-night dessert, we had no idea how
exciting the trip was about to become.
I enjoyed a lovely dessert of red velvet bread pudding with
a side of coffee. Jordan enjoyed a
beautiful crème brulee with a heaping side of food poisoning. The next morning as she pushed me out of her
way to projectile vomit ALL OVER THE BATHROOM, I suspected something might be
wrong. When I say all over, I mean all over.
It was on the door, in the bathtub, on the counter, and little bit made
it into the toilet. As she surveyed the crime
scene, there was only one thing for me to say….”Now it feels like a
bachelorette party.” I’ve tried
desperately to find a “blame it on the crème brulee” shirt, but it doesn’t
exist.
Jordan was in no position to vacation that day, so I decided
to let her sleep it off recover in the room while I took advantage of
the Charleston boutique scene. This
actually worked out great. I felt bad
that Jordan was so sick, but there’s nothing worse than having people just sit
there and watch you be sick when there’s nothing they can do for you. Plus, Jordan isn’t as big of a fan of
shopping as I am. This way, she could
rest, and I could take my time painstakingly walking all of King Street,
visiting every single store that does not exist in Oklahoma City. We both ended
up having good days, all things considered.
I spent way too much money on clothes and books and jewelry, and Jordan
got to sleep all day - something she never gets to do anymore. Who knew having kids could make you thankful
for a sick day all to yourself.
Oh, did I mention I got to see a celebrity?
This was pretty exciting.
I was heading back to the hotel, when a store window for a tiny little
boutique caught my eye. I wandered in
and started looking around. I could hear
another customer discussing a potential purchase with the owner. The customer wanted to buy two items that
were part of different sets, and the owner was falling all over herself to be
accommodating. “Southern folks are so
nice,” I thought to myself. Finally she said, “Well, I own the store, so I’m
just going to let you break those up and buy them however you want.” The customer responded enthusiastically. I
thought the customer’s voice sounded oddly familiar. I turned around and found myself face to face
with Hillary Swank – two time Oscar winner and star of Amelia, one of the worst
movies ever made.** I just stared at her
for what felt like an inappropriately long time. Finally I decided that I
needed to either buy something or leave because I was quickly becoming the
weirdo who stares at people while they’re trying to shop. I left as quietly as
I’d entered, but I was forever changed.
Well, okay that’s a little dramatic.
But I do now have a fun, less vomity, trip memory.***
Here I am in front of the boutique that was the site of
my celebrity encounter. It’s called Noddy. Seriously.
By that evening, Jordan was feeling much better. She oohed and aahed over all my purchases and
even feigned an appropriate level of enthusiasm for my Hillary Swank encounter
(even though she had no idea who that was).
We ventured out for a fancy dinner, followed by a trek to the local
Pandora store so I could get a charm to commemorate our trip. I didn’t figure they’d have a specific
Charleston charm, so we spent the walk thinking of options - a little house for our tour, a crab because
we’re close to the beach, perhaps a king’s crown for King Street. It turns out they do have Charleston charms,
but they’re super tacky and terrible.
However, the sales lady mentioned one option I hadn’t considered – a
pineapple. All along our tour, the houses
had pineapple designs incorporated into their gates and posts, because the
pineapple is the symbol for Southern hospitality. I was still considering my options when the
sales lady told me the following fun fact: During the Civil War, ladies whose
husbands were off fighting would put a pineapple on their porch to let other
gentlemen know they were open to receiving a little male attention. That’s all I needed to hear. I love my little pineapple charm so much!
Bright and early Sunday morning, Jordan and I enjoyed our
final breakfast and headed to services at the St. Michael’s Episcopal
church. This site was included on our
walking tour. It’s the oldest church
building in Charleston with actual signers of the Declaration of Independence
buried in its cemetery. The church
service was really great – it was formal, as is the Episcopal way, but had some
definite modern sensibilities too. It
was Jubilee Sunday, a day for everything to begin anew. It was a lovely idea to meditate on as I
approach my wedding. During the prayer
time, Jordan took the opportunity to pray for Milton and me specifically as we
start our lives together.
For our last day in Charleston, Jordan and I decided to
finally make use of our rental car and drive out of the city to tour a
plantation home. Side note – I’m so glad
we didn’t spend $800 on a rental car, because we pretty much walked everywhere
with the exception of this last day. Our walking tour guide from day one told
us that there were two plantations she would absolutely visit over all others –
Boone Hall and Middleton Place. The only
difference was that Middleton Place has a restaurant that serves the “world’s
best fried chicken.” Upon hearing this, Jordan and I gave each other a knowing glance. Maybe we can catch
Boone Hall on our next trip.
On our way out of town, we happened upon the Emanuel African
Methodist Episcopal Church, the site of the recent shooting. We hadn’t wanted to visit otherwise because
it didn’t feel like a tourist destination, but we were happy to get to see
it. Having been to Charleston now and
seeing how intimate the community is, I have a better appreciation for just how
tragic and emotionally devastating this event was for the whole town.
It was a beautiful drive out to the plantation, full of
winding roads lined with centuries old trees. It rained the entire time we were
there, but we still thoroughly enjoyed our day. The fried chicken did not
disappoint…neither did the mint julep, cornbread, mac and cheese, fried okra,
and whatever else we ate that I can’t even remember now. The plantation came
complete with sheep! And ladies who weave things! And adorable Asian babies wrapped in beach towels (not sure why...the rain, maybe?). And lots of twisty trails and
gardens that were probably great for sneaking away with a beau, but terrible
for trying to figure out how to get back to the main entryway. Luckily we did
make it back. We were completely soaked,
but we had a great time overall. Here are a few pics from our afternoon.
We were sad to see our trip end, but we had to get back to
our real lives. We had the best time,
and I’m so thankful we were able to get away for a few days. It’s so much harder now than it used to
be. I really appreciate Jordan making
the time to commemorate this exciting time in my life. It was as if no time had passed since law
school. Even Milton could sense our joy when I would call him each night. Milton
and I could barely have a conversation from all the side convos and laughter
that ensued between Jordan and I. Milton finally said, “It sounds like
you guys really get along well.” We do, Milton.
We really do.
This was the perfect final
fling before the ring, even though it was pretty tame. Trust me, that's how we like it. But Jordan did manage to score a little action. No preggo journey through airport security
would be complete without a thorough pat-down.
Next on the pre-wedding list….showers, showers, and more
showers. I can’t wait to tell you all about it!
*Our tour guide said it was the oldest theater in America,
but Google disagrees. They gave the
title to some little venue in Philadelphia.
At any rate, this place is the oldest theater in Charleston. Wikipedia notes that it was the first
building in America built exclusively to be used for theatrical
performances.
** I kid you not.
It’s the worst. I’ll save you
what feels like six hours, but is probably only two – Amelia Earhart is born, learns how to fly a
plane (and not in a way that’s remotely interesting), and then she crashes in
the ocean where it is assumed she’s dead. And you are relieved that it’s
finally over.
**The reasons I didn’t ask her for a picture or autograph
are two-fold. (1) The last time I met a
celebrity, I asked for a picture and got shot down. I felt really stupid and swore to myself I
would never be over excited about a celebrity encounter again. They’re just
people….who make movies and millions of dollars. (2) Charleston is humid, remember? By that point in the day, I looked like a
dripping, puddle of a human being and probably smelled like swamp thing.
