June-2 2009

June 2009

The second of our visits was to Magnolia Plantation which would have been almost ‘next door’ to Middleton Place when they were first built. Unlike the brick facade of the latter, this plantation house looked much more ‘southern’. The first house on this site was indeed of English red brick and lasting from 1680 to 1811 before being destroyed by fire.
A second house followed built of cypress on a base of brick salvaged from the fire. This house was also burned but this time by General Sherman in the Civil War. The current house was also built on the brick lower floor and has been modified twice since then in 1895 and 1995. It is ironic that the roof to ground Greek style columns were part of the final alterations and yet it is these which lend the traditional ‘southern’ style.
The interior of the house was a fine museum setting for artifacts from many periods of the history of the house.

As with Middleton Place, the original front facade and entry for the house would have been towards the river and not to the road as it now appears. Apart from the magnolias which were in bloom the extensive gardens were not at their best. The bulk of these is dedicated to azaleas and rhododendrons which had almost all flowered much earlier in the year. None the less we enjoyed the beautiful gardens while trying to keep one step ahead of the mosquitoes. We thought that the original layout had been somewhat lost by the relentless overgrowth of many of the trees and larger shrubs.

Bird and insect life were very rich amongst all the dense shrubs. The dragonflies occasionally paused just long enough to enable photography but not always with perfect focus. What looks good on the screen on the back of the camera does not always pass scrutiny on a large computer screen! I have included the best that I could but perfection is often lacking.
It was great to spend time with Mark, Bridget, Christopher and Aspen but we mainly did our own thing as the other grandparents see much less of the grandchildren than we do at present with our summers in Colorado.
We did not brave the parking in downtown Charleston but used the hotel shuttle to visit our favourite haunts and restaurants.
We were of course here for a wedding and we were pleased to be invited to all the pre-wedding parties and mingle with lots of the other guests. By the end of our time here we felt we had a much greater familiarity with Charleston and its surrounds than was possible from our own boat.