The One with Spiel Stevenberg

The week leading up to Thanksgiving break was CRAZY!!! We all had soooooo much work to hand in, papers and presentations and short papers and proposals and AAAAARGHHHH!!!!! But we managed it all, even Marcella (from the Netherlands) who was still working on a paper the day we were supposed to leave so we ended up leaving a few hours later than planned... but it worked out ok :)

We (Marcella, Becca, James and I) left at around 3.00 on the POP 105 bus to the car hire place. We got our car (a Chevy something-or-other), and with Marcella driving, Becca navigating and James and I providing the music, we left down the mountain to Columbia, South Carolina. It took us around three hours (with a quick stop at Wendy's for food). We were going to drop James off with his second cousin who he had never met before and then continue on to Charleston. We got to Bill and Marge's house after a lot of wrong turns and directions from people in a dodgy gas station, but we made it eventually. Marge (James's second cousin) and Bill were really welcoming and friendly. Their house was gorgeous, really homely and warm, and they have a beautiful dog called Cheyenne. They had set out supper for us, and they had PROPER ENGLISH TEA, and TATE AND LYLE GOLDEN SYRUP and MARKS AND SPENCERS LEMON CURD!!!!! They have travelled all over the world, but they especially love Cornwall. They work with an organisation called CLC Ministries as Christian missionaries setting up Christian bookshops all over the world. They had so many fun stories to tell :)

We spent the night in their lovely extension which has a bedroom, a living room with a sofa bed and its own bathroom and kitchen area. We had breakfast there the next day (MORE TEA = YAY!!!!!), then we left James there and set off for Charleston. Our girly road trip was about to begin!!! We had a pretty uneventful drive to Charleston as it was only about an hour and a half from Columbia. We arrived and went to the visitor's centre where we picked up leaflets and brochures so we could decide a plan of action. We went to find some food and while we ate we planned what we were going to do. First we went to the slave museum, the aquarium and a few other places along the way. We checked in to our Best Western hotel and then rested for an hour. We drove back in to Charleston to eat at a restaurant called Vickery's. We then decided to have an early night, so we went back to the hotel and slept.

The next morning was Thankgiving. We had heard that there was an event called the "Turkey Day Race". It was a race which lots of people took part in, so we had breakfast at Starbucks and watched the action. We also observed a mother on the table behind us who had dressed her baby up in a turkey outfit... scary. We then decided to have a carriage ride. Our horse was called Zag, and it was a very fun and informative ride, we learnt a lot about Charleston. One of the strange things was that because there were quite a few carriage companies operating in Charleston, they had to have a way of telling them which routes to go so as not to cause a congestion problem. The way they decide this is with a little bingo machine outside a hut, and every time a carriage pulls up to it they spin it and whichever colour ball comes out is the route they take. We happened to get a blue ball. We saw some of the typical houses in Charleston called "Charleston singles", which are very narrow on the street side of the house but very long, so the square footage was still pretty high. This was just to save space. We also learnt that many houses in Charleston have spaces on the side of their houses which we assumed were porches, but are actually called piazzas. A piazza is built into the architecture of the house, whereas a porch is added afterward. Apparently Obama mentioned the "porches of Charleston" in his inauguration speech, and the people of Charleston were not amused. We saw a couple of houses with pineapples on their gateposts. These were used in the 1800s and early 1900s as a way to tell people you were back from holiday and were ready to receive visitors.

We then took a stroll in Waterfront Park. This is a beautiful stretch of park along the shore where there are beautiful fountains, grassy areas and (the best bit of all) a wooden promenade with swinging benches. We had great fun on these. We also saw some massive birds which turned out to be pelicans. The waterfront was absolutely gorgeous in the sunlight, with all the palm trees we were sure we had taken a wrong turn and ended up in Florida! Rainbow row is also a famous landmark in Charleston. It is a stretch of houses near the waterfront which are all painted an assortment of pretty rainbow colours. It was really awesome in the sunshine :) Another feature of Charleston we liked was that lots of houses had little lamps outside their doors which had flames in them (gas powered, the council helps them with their gas bills if they purchase them because they add to the charm of the city). In a pub called Tommy Condons (Irish) we had our first ever Thanksgiving dinner. We ate roast turkey, green bean casserole, candied yams (sweet potatoes - really sweet and tasted like they had spices in them) and stuffing/cornbread (we couldn't tell which it was). It was nice, but strange. We also did a ghost walk in Charleston, led by a weird woman who was talking more about the energy of people who have passed than actual ghosts themselves. She was talking about the science behind why people see ghosts, which was kind of interesting...

The next morning we set off for Wilmington, North Carolina. It was around a five hour drive, but we stopped at various places. Most memorably we stopped at a place called Myrtle Beach, which is about halfway between Charleston and Wilmington. Myrtle Beach is like a bigger, more American version of Blackpool or Skegness. It is extremely touristy, although most of the hotels had closed until March. We just wanted to see the beach really, so we wandered along it. It was a beautiful beach, with proper white sand and really blue water. The weather was yet again gorgeous, and we really appreciated the sun. We spent about an hour in Myrtle Beach, then continued on to Wilmington. When we arrived in Wilmington, we parked up and wandered up the main street, then along the pier. Wilmington is GORGEOUS. I could actually see myself living there, it seems really quiet and friendly, and everything is beautiful. Marcella happens to be a massive Dawson's Creek fan (a TV show) and I am a massive One Tree Hill fan (a TV show) which both happen to be filmed in Wilmington, so we were in heaven. Everywhere we walked, we saw places that we recognised from the show. It was AMAZING!!!

We got sheets from the tourist information place telling us the main locations from both shows, so we set about finding the main ones we wanted to see. We had lunch at a place called Hells Kitchen (from Dawsons Creek) which made Marcella ridiculously happy. We saw the bridge and the river court (basketball court) from One Tree Hill, which means my life is now officially complete :) We saw various other places including one of the shops used in OTH, the pier restaurant used in DC, and the record store used in OTH (I bought a CD there!). We also had a boat ride, which took us across the Cape Fear River to the Battleship North Carolina (one of the most haunted ships in America). We had a Hollywood location tour from a guy who called himself Spiel Stevenberg (he actually was the spitting image of Steven Spielberg). He showed us around various locations around Wilmington which were used in films and TV shows (films filmed in Wilmington or "Wilmywood" include 28 Days with Sandra Bullock and Viggo Mortensen, Black Dog with Patrick Swayze and Meatloaf, Blue Velvet with Dennis Hopper and Isabella Rossellini, Weekend at Bernies, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1&2) and Raw Deal with Arnie himself). It was a really funny yet interesting tour, with lots of interesting locations including a diner FILLED with Coke memorabilia, everything down to the napkin holders and the bar stools, but they only sell Pepsi.

We also had a ghost talk the same night from the same person (this time dressed as a pirate calling himself Captain Wilder). We walked around Wilmington (supposed to be one of the most haunted places in the US (one of the programmes I watch called Ghost Hunters has filmed there three times)). It showed us a different side of Wilmington, and we saw a lot more of the city. We ate the second night at a restaurant they used in Dawson's Creek called Elijah's. It was on the waterfront and we sat at the window so the view as the sun was setting was beautiful. Whilst in Wilmington we also took two carriage tours, one the first night and one the second night. We had the same horse both times, called Harry. The tour company save horses who were used by the Ahmish but were too slow for what they needed them for. The carriages were really cute, they even had blankets for everyone to cover up when it got cold. We had two different tour guides but they were both really interesting and we went on different routes both times so we got to see more of the city. Seeing a city at night on a horse-drawn carriage with all the Christmas lights on was pretty magical. We all three agreed that while we loved both places, we would rather visit Charleston and live in Wilmington.

We set off on Sunday morning to Charlotte where we were going to pick up James (Bill dropped him off at Carolina Place mall, which gave us a few hours to wander around the mall before they arrived). We tried out $1 massage chairs, which was a painful but hilarious experience. We ate lunch and spent about an hour in Barnes and Noble, which is a famous chain of bookstores here in America. We picked James up, exchanged gifts with Bill (they had gotten us Christmas gifts of books and we got them gifts to thank them for letting us stay (a candle holder with a Christmas tree on it, cinnamon candles and a bag of baked dog treats from a special bakery called the K-9 coastal bakery in Wilmington which were shaped like gingerbread men and Christmas trees). We drove back home, stopping at Applebee's for dinner. We were so tired that we just fell straight to sleep. All in all, an awesome Thanksgiving break with two of my favourite internationals :)