Monday, March 26, 2012

Charleston

Ashish and I, along with my brother, Avery, and SIL, Tasha escaped for a weekend vacation to Charleston. Before I get into the details of the trip let me say this...stay for more than two days! That's my advice to anyone that has never been but would like to. There are so many great things to see and do, there is no way that you can do it all in a day and a half! Now, onto the details!!!

We left Atlanta about 3:30pm. BAD IDEA! Atlanta traffic is the absolute worst. Anyone that has been to Atlanta knows this. It doesn't have to be rush hour, it could be the middle of a beautiful sunny weekend day and the downtown connector will be at a stand still. It's ridiculous. So, I'm sure you're asking "why did you decide to leave in the middle of the day?" Well, Avery had to work a half day and that was the earliest that we could leave. So, after sitting in traffic we finally get rolling. We cruise through the eastern suburbs of Atlanta and into Augusta. I'd never been to Augusta and didn't realize that it was so close to the SC border. It seems like as soon as we crossed into SC the sky fell out. Luckily it didn't rain the whole time but there were bouts of heavy downpours every 30-45 minutes. I planned to take a pic but never got around to it.

We made it to our hotel at 9:00pm. Typically it would only take 5ish hours to get to Charleston but because of the rain, we were set back an hour. We stayed at the Radisson in North Charleston. All in all, it was a nice hotel. They have Sleep Number beds, Ashish was thrilled. I, on the other hand, not so much. We don't own a SN Bed, nor do we plan to, but I didn't like that the mattress was lumpy in the middle where the different "numbers" met. I digress, we hurried and changed clothes and headed out for dinner.


We didn't want to drive into downtown Charleston so we settled on a restaurant near the hotel called The Noisy Oyster. They had oysters. It wasn't too noisy. The food was AWFUL! I don't know if it was because it was nearing closing time or if they weren't that busy so everyone in the kitchen took a smoke break but it took forever to get our food. I ordered the bacon wrapped shrimp-fried hard as a brick, Ashish had the shrimp and grits-looked more like soup, Tasha ordered the gumbo-rice with sausage on top, Avery ordered fish, broiled, not fried-it came out fried. The waiter explained that he was new and hadn't quite learned the ropes so we gave him a pass but the food, not that great. After eating we left and decided to call it a night, we had a full day planned for Saturday.

Saturday morning we woke up refreshed, although I decided that I hated the SN Bed somewhere between 2-4am. The weather was dreary outside. My mood was a little in the dumps because it looked like the sky was going to fall out at any moment. We got dressed anyway and decided to take our chances. I'm so glad we did. As we were driving downtown the sunny came out and stayed out through both of the tours that we scheduled! We took a carriage ride through Charleston then went on a boat tour out to Fort Sumter, Folly Beach, and Mt. Pleasant. We had lunch a cute little restaurant called A.W. Shucks. Great food, I highly recommend it.




Always have to get a pic of a pharmacy-for those that don't know, my hubby is a pharmacist!

It can be yours for the low price of 13 million!





After our tours we decided to hit the outlets! What's a vacation without a little bit of shopping? Right? Remember me mentioning that the sky looked like it was going to fall out? Well, it did, right as we were getting out of the car at the outlets. We were SOAKED! Good times! Good times! We shopped anyway, in the pouring rain. Ashish snagged a new pair of Nike Shox. I scored a new COACH purse and a new watch! All in all, a successful shopping trip!

After all of that we headed back to the hotel for rest and relaxation before going out to dinner. We decided to eat at The Charleston Crab House. The food was okay, nothing to write home to mom about but good. The highlight of our night was going to The Market Place Pavilion rooftop bar. The night was great. From the rooftop you could see all of Charleston. I didn't expect it to be like a nightclub up there. There was a deejay playing all the latest music, drinks were flowing, laughter was loud. We had a great time!

Sunday, it was time to head home. J was staying with my parents. With all of the pollen, his allergies were going crazy and he wasn't feeling great. He had a miraculous recovery while were were driving home because he was completely fine once we got home. I think he just missed us!

We'd definitely go back to Charleston again, we had a great time!

5 comments:

Faith said...

I love all the pictures!! I hate trying a new restaurant when traveling and finding out the food is awful!! Hate that! I love brig able to try new restaurants when I travel so I get a bit annoyed when the food isn't great.

Anywho, glad you had a great time!! Scoring an awesome Coach purse is always sweet!

Faith said...

Being*

Two Dozen and Change said...

LOVE Charleston and LOVE all of these sweet pictures! Sounds like you had a blast!!

Pegster said...

Sounds like such an awesome weekend getaway. I love Charleston too, I only went there once but it was such a lovely city.

Oooh and getting the Coach purse, definitely a plus

Abby the Tiny Traveler said...

I moved to NC last year and have been itching to take a road trip to Charleston! Looks like you had an awesome time. Maybe I'll make it to Charleston by the end of this year!