Day 6: The one with houses, gardens and alligators.

white ibis

Today was Charleston day! We planned on spending all day visiting the grand old city of Charleston, South Carolina. We accomplished that feat, because my feet will never be the same. We started our grand tour at plantation houses and gardens. Padmini and I went to different ones, because each house had its own personality that our personalities found intriguing. I will tell the stories of both. I will start with me. I chose to go to the Magnolia Plantation. Yes, the name was a draw, but so were the gardens and story behind the house. The plantation has been owned by the same family since the 1630's. The original house burned down after a lightning strike in 1810. Reverend Drayton, who was the property owner at the time, because of the death of his older brother in a hunting accident, rebuilt the house. The house was burned again during the Civil War. Drayton rebuilt, on a much smaller scale since most of the plantation owners were now mostly residing in the city of Charleston, and only coming out to the plantation as needed. The war cost made him and most of the other plantation owners broke, so he sold all of his property, and part of Magnolia, and used that money to rebuild the house and re do the gardens. He was the first to bring in Japanese camellias that now fill the south. He brought in close to 2000 varieties. He opened his gardens to the public and became the first tourist attraction in Charleston. Now that the history lesson has concluded, let the pictures begin!

live oaks along the Ashley river, the plantation grew rice, and they transported using the Ashley river

reflective turtles

so like, I really love this bridge okay, you should see how many I didn't put up on the blog!

azaleas

Cloudy Sulfur is his name

cherry blossoms, one tree contains pink, white and mixed...I didn't know that!

cannonball fired on Ft. Sumter.  Rev. Drayton collected them because he said, "you never know which might have been the one that started the war."

magnolia plantation house

look!!  I made it into my blog....

My favorite part of the trip was the swamp gardens on the plantation.  I really really love wildlife.  This was the perfect place for me, the swampier the better!!  So I present the swamp gardens of magnolia plantation in all its wild swampiness!

black gum swamp

swampy flowers

flight of the blue winged teals

green heron hunting

yellow bellied sliders,

green anole strutting his stuff

rookery...heron, cormorant, egret nests

little gator

almost stepped on him

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Padmini's trip to Middleton Place
 

Middleton Place has the oldest terraced gardens in the United States.  It was part of a dowry that was given to Henry Middleton when he married his bride.  Henry planned and created the gardens for ten years.  The family was very political. They participated in the continental congresses, acted as senators and governors and were very politically connected.

One of the Middletons built several wings upon the house with a music conservatory and rooms called gentlemen’s quarters for businessmen traveling back and forth on the Ashley River.  At the time of the Civil War, the owner of the house was a backer of the Confederacy.  When the Union army was headed that way, the family fled and returned to find the house burned down.  They rebuilt the north flank of the house, and supported themselves through lumber trade.  The family was able to get back some of the documents and paintings from a Union doctor who was with the army as they took over the house.  He saved a lot of the items and kept them in his possession, and later sold them back to the family and left the rest to a college. 

Middleton Place stayed in the family, including the Pringles, who restored the gardens and opened the gardens in 1919. 

The most beautiful part of Middleton Place is how it is situated on a bend in the Ashley River, so the layout of the house and gardens is a natural flow to the river. 

Middleton Place

the gardens leading out the the Ashley river

The Middleton Oak.  and ancient live oak that was and is used at a marker for placement in the river for hundreds of years