South Carolina and North Carolina

So we left Savannah after a great two weeks and stopped in Lexington South Carolina (near Columbia) and spent several days with a dear old friend from our days in Simpsonville SC, Chris Connolly.we arrived on Wednesday and Chris was at the campground a few hours later. We caught up on kids, travels, health, politics and all sorts of other things over some good wine (no surprise there). She took us to Fatz for dinner and we had some of the best ribs! We only had four days there and didn't let any grass grow under our feet. The next day we met her at the Riverbanks Zoo in Columbia. What a great zoo but the most amazing building was the aquarium. They had the most extensive display of water animals! I would definitely say this was one of the best aquariums I've ever visited.

Never saw storks on the nests with eggs before.

This guy was just laying around until they started feeding him.

This was a learned activity - raising his legs. He actually did one at a time and then both together. They actually had him hop up and down.

What a face!

 

Yes these Galapagos tortoises are really doing what it looks like.

The next day we went to the South Carolina State Museum. Really interesting and quite impressive. It started with this view into the gift shop:

I saw this and couldn't believe my eyes! It looks like Aunt Jemima or at least something to do with slaves. I knew we were in the South and this was a museum so figured there was some latitude here but not that much.it actually is a baseball hat on a stand over a t-shirt. The hat has a black bill and a black triangle in the fron and a white hat. Realizing this was a hat restored my faith in racial sensitivity in these times.

Check this out. The art work is made entirely out of soda bottle caps.

This sign was in a 1960's display.

Following the tour of the museum, we drove downtown and took Chris to one of our favorite general stores - Mast General Store. We first discovered the original store in upper Western NC a couple of years ago and were so impressed with it. Yes the prices are high but the selection of clothes, shoes, bric-a-brac, kitchen stuff, outdoor stuff, old-fashioned toys, games and candy makes it a total delight to go to. There are several Mast General stores across the south east. As it turns out, there was one in downtown Columbia and Chris had never been. She so enjoyed it and couldn't believe it had been there for years and she never heard of it. From there we went to a Braxilian churascarrio for dinner. Yet another new experience for Chris. Following a couple bottles of wine and a lot of really great food, we finally said good night and we all went to out respective homes for a good night's sleep as we had another fun day ahead of us.

Anyone who knows Ernie and I know we are always on the hunt for good barbeque. Now, in Texas, that means, beef brisket, ribs and sausage. In the deep South, it means pork! Mainly pulled but also chopped. We fell in love with pulled pork barbeque when we lived in the Carolinas and have never gotten it out of our system. It is our first love when it comes to barbeque. We have been enjoying a lot of really good pulled pork and some OK pulled pork on this trip. While watching an Anthony Bourdain show a couple of weeks earlier, he was in South Carolina and talked about a barbeque joint in Hemingway SC and said that it was considered in the top 5 of barbeque joints in the US. Well, it was about 2 hours away from Columbia and we just had to make the trip. We were on a quest on Saturday to find this little piece of barbeque heaven. Boy were we surprised when we got there. This bbq joint is in the middle of nowhere - literally at a crossroads in the country.

The quonset hut style building houses the pits. The store is just that, a country store and a very small kitchen where you buy your food. Drinks are in a soda refrigerator.

 

Across the street was an overhead shelter with picnic tables. That's it! We waited about 30 minutes to get to the front of the line to order. Besides BBQ plates, you could order pork by the pound or have a whole pig cooked (had to pre-order that). They also had bags of fried pork rinds and boiled peanuts.

It was delicious!!!!! Some of the best pulled pork we've ever eaten. While we were eating, the line just kept getting longer - curling around in the store and eventually out the door.

We just had to stop in and meet and thank Rodney for his work. What an operation!

 

Rodney burns his wood in this metal barrel and then carries the coals to the pits.

Here they are flipping over a pig.

 

The drive home was all through back roads and little towns. When we told Chris that we wanted to go to Hemingway for barbeque, she thought we were a bit crazy because there was really good BBQ in Columbia but she was up for the ride. When we got to the crossroads, we all looked at each other and laughed and decided this will make a good story if not good eating. As we stood in line and talked with folks from Georgia and other far away places, the stories were all the same - either grew up near here and had to come every time they were back for a visit or simply drove over fir the food. When we finished eating, all three of us agreed that this was a great find. In fact, Chris was going to bring her friend (a BBQ aficionados) to Scotts.

After three full days, we decided on a day of rest (no touring anywhere). Ernie stayed at the camper to get some stuff ready to leave the next day while I went to Chris's house for one last visit. You know how you sometimes have a friend or cousin that you were really close with when you were younger and then you lost touch with them or you only get together with them every few years but when you do get together, it's like it was only a week ago that you last saw them ----- well, I'm so fortunate to have several friends like that and Chris is one of them.

Monday morning we said goodbye to South Carolina and headed for Advance, North Caroline for a two week stay. More on that in my next posting.

 

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