From Charleston

Yep, we found Cousin Michael up in Charleston. And that’s not all, Cousin Dale and his wife, Glenda were rolling through in their RV, (they are full timers) so we had a cousin get-together.

What else did we do in Charleston? Well, we didn’t take a carriage ride, we didn’t visit a plantation, we didn’t do a ghost tour and we didn’t do a harbor tour. We walked,

and walked,

and walked,

and walked,

and walked.

Captain walked around, in and out, up and down the aircraft carrier, USS Yorktown,

while ABN walked through The Gibbes art museum

and the art district including a cool art store.

Taking advantage of the low country culinary delights, together we did a walking Taste of Charleston tour, sampling chicken ‘n dumplings, collard greens, cornbread,

fried green tomatoes,

barbecue, wings , artichokes and focaccia.

We rode our bike over the roads and bike path of the beautiful James Island County Park

where The Wanderer was parked.

We found the park staff putting up Christmas lights, 

and a model sailboat race in progress.

It just happened that Old Towne Creek County Park was hosting Brewsday

on Tuesday!

Saying good-bye to lovely Charleston, we treated ourselves to a delightful dinner at 82 Queen.

The Aggies are calling, and we will go. The Wanderer is now pointed westward.

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Savannah, .Aww……….the Memories

Some of our favorite travel memories include a week spent in Savannah six years ago; so totally different than our revisit this week.

What brought us to Savannah in 2010 was the NEI (Nuclear Energy Institute) conference. (Captain spent 40 years in the nuclear energy industry.)  After the conference we extended our visit into a vacation.

On the company’s dime, we stayed at a luxury hotel, after the conference we moved to a Hilton Garden Inn. This is our lodging for this visit.

Skidaway Island State Park is spacious, pretty and very quiet. (Is it okay to collect the Spanish moss if it is lying on the ground?)

As part of the conference we dined in up-scaled restaurants requiring “dress-up.” ABN remembers navigating these streets in high heels!

This trip, definitely Teva’s!

We don’t recall who all attended the conference but we remember having drinks with Captain’s boss, Mike and of course Adam and Marissa from sales.

The highlight of the trip was an evening at “Tubby’s” on River Street.

A really good vocalist/guitarist was playing (sounded a lot like Zack Brown.) It was very crowded which left us standing at the bar. ABN happened to be wearing a leather jacket and leather beret; a guy approached her and says something like “Please tell me you have a Harley parked on the street.” Long story short, Pete’s party (Pennsylvania Air National Guards) asked us to join their table. We hung out with them the rest of the evening (I think we closed Tubby’s down). His wife, Maureen and ABN remain Facebook friends to this day. We were sad to learn, Tubby’s no longer has live entertainment.

One of the things ABN misses in retirement are the business trips when she could explore while Captain attended the conference. While roaming the streets in 2010, she found Kitchens on the Square and signed herself and Captain up for a cooking class.

Captain in 2010

The recipe for the Luscious Mac’n Cheese served at our annual Texas BBQ came from that class. Of course it was on our list of places to revisit, sadly this is what we found.

We did find the Farmer’s Market

at Forsyth Park on Saturday

and walked over 10,000 steps exploring the city. We love all the green squares General James Oglethorpe planned when he laid out the city in 1733 and appreciate that the city continues to maintain 22 of the squares.(very nice for taking breaks from exploring.)

On Sunday, Captain dropped ABN in the city so she could once again explore her favorite shops (her way)

while he visited the Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum.

We didn’t find any relatives or old friends in Savannah but we heard there might be a cousin in Charleston. Headed that way to check it out.

And how about those Aggies! Whoop!

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Lovely Greenville

Settling in at Paris Mountain State Park in Greenville, SC, we spent the last few days hanging out with our friends, Carol and Lee. (You may remember them from Quilt Week.)

Greenville is such a lovely city with a river running through it.

Reedy River

Lunch at Larkins by the Reedy River.

Carol was proud to show us her alma mater, the beautiful campus of  Furman University.

ABN drooled over the garden in the sustainable living project.

Lee took us to the Dark Corner Distillery.

We enjoyed crepes for breakfast at Tandem’s before a 25 mile ride along the Swamp Rabbit Trail.

What did we see along the trail?

Recycled Art

The trail downtown.

Conveniently located along the trail

ABN was surprised by a phone call from a long lost cousin who happened to live nearby. Invited to dinner at Phil and Karen’s, of course we accepted and had a delightful evening catching up the past 50 years or so.

On to Texas, but first lets meander over to the coast.

And we leave with a new pillow, a gift made by Carol!

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About to Cross the Line

This past week we hopped over to Jordan Lake near Raleigh so Captain could connect with a friend from his college days at A & M

and so we could get a tandem ride in with our friends, Claude and Smith.

We skittled back to Western North Carolina to spend the weekend with our niece, Sue, and her husband, Dave, at the construction site of their retirement home, The Moose Lodge, near Marble.

Yep, Captain was the sign artist.

Captain gets an introduction to skeet sheeting

and helped Dave finish the cover for the wood pile.

ABN got her long awaited visit to the John C. Campbell Folk Art School. You guessed right, it is in her plan to return to take a class. The big decision is which one(s!)

Nothing feeds our souls like spending time with family and watching the Aggies bring home a victory.

After wandering around in North Carolina the past two weeks, we are now crossing the state line into South Carolina.

If you usually get blog updates via email, we are guessing you did not receive notification of the update posted last Monday. We don’t know why the notifications didn’t go out but ABN has clicked around on the website and hopefully you have received notification of this post. If you really want to know where we were, who we were with, what we did, what we ate, then you probably need to get a life can go to the web site www.livingrichlyinretirement.blogspot.com

Jordan Lake, North Carolina

Note to email subscribers, hitting reply to the email notification of a new post will send your reply out somewhere in cyber space and we will never know of your comments.  If you wish to comment, please do so in the comment section on the blog site or send a note using the email address you have in your contact list.