Charleston

Next stop: South Carolina. The beach at Palm Island was filling up fast. I thought it was crowded when we got there (about 10:30; it's impossible to leave the house much earlier than that), but there were twice as many people by the time we left. Of course, it wasn't meerly a Sunday, but the Fourth of July, and most people seemed to be setting up to spend the whole day.

I miss walking on the beach, with the waves coming up, and the wet sand, and the patches of shells and pebbles.

Georgia picked up so many shells she kept dropping them and wailing over the loss. Here she has to pick just the four best ones to take home. No taking the whole beach.
Surprisingly, she picked just two in the end, and let the others go without further argument.

After the beach, let the SHOPPING begin.
!!!

I found this fabulous metal pig at TJ's. Without the wings I definitely would have bought it. Love that red red color, and the hidden eyes and the blue trotters. The wings would have been fine if I didn't have to stuff the thing into my getting-overpacked luggage for an intercontinental haul. I really did think about it, though.

After TJ's and window-shopping in the cute little downtown area, and admiring the classic old Southern homes, we got down to business: treasure hunting.

Done shopping? What, already?
You ain't seen nuthin' yet, Tris. (Tristan is so trendy... but Tris is a common laboratory solution buffering agent, Trist is French for Sad... hmmm, what can be done with the middle name... Ben-jammin', that's a good one.)

Book shopping was a Must. The Blue Bicycle (or was it the blue bird? blue heron? blue something) had plenty of books and one cat.

YES, we're still shopping!
Most of the treasure hunting was done at the local thrift stores. Look through everything and eventually you'll find treasure. Which we did. I got a beautiful white linen sleeveless top, and some much-needed shorts.

The funnest thing about treasure hunting I didn't take a photo of. I really should have. A checkout, Georgia noticed a bin with several styrofoam heads in it, and wanted to know what they were for. I told her, naturally, that those were the heads that had been bitten off (having her own head bitten off is something George knows well). All the head stuff had been sucked out; that's why they were white.

Uh huh.
It's so fun how 4-year-olds consider new information.

But where were the bodies, then?

I pointed out all the headless torso forms lining the walls, displaying tops.

M Hmmm.

Their boss got really mad at them, and bit their heads off.

For making too much noise.

Marie says that if there are any nightmares concerning decapitation she'll be calling me. I did explain later that I was only making up a story, and there haven't been any calls.

The nicest part of the area is not the city or its outlying suburbs, but the marshy coastal areas and their fishing boats.

And the marshy coastal areas without boats. Without boats, docks and power lines would be even better, but we ran out of time to track that down.

On my last day, which I had meant to spend on the daytime train to DC but the train was full so I had to take the night train (mistake! Next time reserve early.), we discovered an excellent park just a stone's throw from Marie's house. Wide, level trails, boardwalks across the watery areas, a water park, a viewing tower, a great playground; it's a place they'll be going back to often. A chain of power lines crosses the park, and one of the pillars hosts an osprey nest. Thank goodness for the long lens, as Mom (or Dad?) flew circles above the nest.

And that was Charleston SC. One last vacation day, and it's back to France.

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