Normally when in Charleston, we stay in a marina that is on the eastern side of the city, but that marina was full when we called to make a reservation, so we ended up at a new-to-us marina on the west side. We had made arrangements ahead of our arrival with a boat wash/wax/detailer that we had worked with before to wax and wash during our stay – something we hadn’t done to the decks and below since Michigan and not for a year to the above-decks!
We arrived in the morning and were put out at the end of the “megadock”, a half-mile-long finger dock on the west side of the city. We completed our work day, then headed into town for dinner. I managed to make reservations for our first night at a restaurant called Laurel. Our entire meal there was excellent, and we had a lovely sparkling rose that was suggested by our waiter. He even bought us a glass of the wine we initially tried to order to compare to his suggestion and he was completely right – the one he suggested was much better!!
Since we’d been doing so many early mornings in order to push north as quickly as possible, we decided to sleep in on Saturday morning, and then had brunch on the boat with some breakfast meat from Cocoa Village. In the afternoon, we pulled the scooters off the boat and headed into the city to re-visit a distillery and brewery where we spent the afternoon playing games.
While at the brewery, we managed to make reservations at a restaurant called The Warehouse. It was a tasting menu, which was delicious and we had excellent service. Over the course of dinner, the background music had gradually been getting louder and louder and as we were approaching our dessert course, we noticed that the tables behind us were being moved. Our waiter came over to our table and apologized and explained that at 10pm, the restaurant turned into a night club!! Indeed, as we were eating dessert, it got crowded and loud behind us. We finished up our excellent meal and headed back to the boat for the evening.
On Sunday, we had another lazy morning and then hopped on the scooters to visit the Powder House Museum, a building that had stored gunpowder during the revolutionary war. Though small, it was an interesting museum.
We returned back to the boat just as the cleaners were finishing up a sparkling Highwind.
It was wonderful to spend another weekend at Charleston. This is one of our favourite spots on the ICW!