Girls Trip: celebrating 50

Back to celebrating 50 with a girls' trip to Charleston, South Carolina. Goodbye, Wisconsin.

I still don't love to fly so Tina is my emotional support.

Meeghan helped with my emotional support for our connecting flight from O'Hare.

We arrived in Charleston and picked out our rental vehicle.  They we drove to Folly Beach as recommended by Lori's daughter, Jordyn who has been living in the Charleston area for a few years.  We arrived at the VRBO late and headed straight for the enclosed patio for some drinks.

Morning view from the enclosed patio.  Yay, palm trees!

The VRBO was a great fit for us.  

We had talked about getting a jeep for the rental, but went with the more practical minivan for getting in and out of...50...

The bridge we traveled across to get to the ocean and Folly Beach.  We drove it and walked it many times.

Delicious fish tacos with collard greens. 

Found some partially shaded patio seats to people watch.

Pier out into the ocean.

You can tell from the water line how high the tide is when it comes in.  It creates tidal pools that can be deceivingly deep.  I saw a family with a little kid who almost sank into one.

The sign to the birds made me chuckle.

A storm rolled in while we were on the pier, we decided to wait it out inside Pier 101 at the bar.

It was an impressive downpour, and we were a bit waterlogged, but also a little tipsy by this point, so we decided tacos and tequilla would be amazing!

The statue of Mary opened up a walk down memory lane about our St John's days.

And the tequila shots made everything a little more funny.

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The next day was our day for historical downtown Charleston day.  We spent some morning time in the pool that we had all to ourselves.

Maps were great, and the drive was easy.  We parked in the free parking at the Battery and planned to walk the rest of the day.

From the battery we could see Fort Sumter, an island fortification best known as the site where the first shots of the American Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861.

White Point Garden features lots of grass space and is shaded by beautiful oak trees.

It is also the home of a protected bird species that sits in the trees and drop lots of bird sh*t.

You've been warned....

We then walked the 1 mile or so through historic buildings with beautiful architecture and colorful facades.

It was hot, so we stopped in Tommy Condon's, a classic Irish pub, for a drink. I stuck with my Palmetto Punch.

The other girls went fancy with espresso martinis.

We then walked around the Charleston City Market and dodged some rain drops.  During our walk someone noticed that Brenda had bird sh*t on her shirt.  After many laughs, we got her cleaned up.  Twenty minutes or so later, we noticed more.  Poor Brenda.  

We went to Henry's for lunch.

Meeghan, Brenda, and I decided to go on a ghost tour.  The storytelling was good.

The location of a famous duel, at night the ghosts sometimes reappear.

She explained that sometimes, when photos are taken, if you see an orb of light, it is a ghost.  If you look in the picture below, the bottom left has a green orb.  Green orbs are good spirits; red orbs are evil.

It felt like a long walk back to the Battery, but we made it and finished the night on the porch.

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On our last day, we went back to the ocean.

I wandered down the pier and watched some people fishing off of the pier.

I met this family from Arkansas and took a picture of the baby shark he caught.

It was too small to keep, so he had to throw it back.  Check out the fishhead bait on that hook.

At the Bounty Bar, we found some bar trivia, in honor of our 50th birthdays we named our team the Sally O'Malley's from an SNL skit.  We didn't do well, but we had fun.

A picture of our security measures for the VRBO.  If someone broke in they would trip over the shoe organizer and then....well, we didn't know what, but it seemed like a good idea.

On one of our flights home, Tina and I were in the very last seats on the plane.  Our view from the backseat.

Beautiful area to visit, fantastic people to visit it with.