We were all pumped for our second day.  We had tickets for a horse carriage tour around downtown Charleston.  We raced downstairs to have breakfast and get our name on the shuttle list.  Dang it!  The only place the shuttle goes to is the cruise docks.  They give people who are going on a cruise a discount on the hotel room and a shuttle ride to the boat if they spend their 1st night in their hotel.  Good for them, bad for us.

Well we checked the weather again.  Another hot and humid day.  I guess we’ll take the car into town and then do some sightseeing in the air conditioned comfort of the car.  Good plan.

So we checked out the parking to find a cheaper spot and we headed out.  The horse carriage place we went to was Palmetto Carriage Tours.  They told us all the horses were brought back to a place where they got plenty of water and big fans blew on them.  I hope they weren’t lying.

So we were loaded into our carriage with another family.  Of our two fillies, one was relatively new to the game and the other had been doing her job for a few years.  The girl told us about the term “slacker” and told us the new filly was a “slacker” because she let the other horse do most of the pulling so her leads were slack.  She required a little more “giddy ups” the the other horse 😊 .

Each carriage has to stop at a little building where they are given a number to put on their carriage and they draw a route to take.  This way not everyone is on the same route clogging up the streets.  Remember when I said the streets were narrow?  They were barely big enough for the carriage and a car to pass at the same time.

So here is a carriage

Pretty

Not ours, but you get the drift.  The girl we had was real and good and very informative.  Did you know what the reason was for the side porches or piazzas, on the houses?

Another house

House with side porch

Not only did the porch allow them to catch a cool breeze when it was hot but if the door was open, it meant, come on in for a visit.  If it was closed, the ladies of the house were probably out there in their unmentionables.

We also drove by the old jail

Old Jail

The girl was telling us about how the jail had no running water or electric.  They closed the jail because they thought it was too inhumane for the prisoners.  Later, much later, they put a day care in there!  I certainly hope they put in electric and running water for the kids.  Today it is kind of a white elephant and is only used for haunted tours.

She told us about many interesting facts as we drove around.  I’ll give her and her horses credit for handling the traffic and loud noises.  One road we went down, we had to pull over to the side because a garbage truck came down the road at the same time.  While we were pulled over, the garbage truck stopped and took out the trash.  Those poor horses were scared by the loud noise but the girl talked to them and kept them some what calm.

When we were done with the carriage ride, we hopped in the car and I drove where ever Gary told me to go.  I adjusted my side mirrors so I could see how close I was to objects that we passed.  We decided to head down by the ocean to a park that was there

Park down by the water

From there we could see the cruise ship dock

Cruise ship

And I saw this weird tree there

Weird tree

I wonder what those nubs are for?  When is Google going to come out with an app where you can take a picture of something and Google will tell me what it is.  That would be soooo helpful.

What is that?

We saw a pilot boat

Pilot boat like the one from our Alaskan cruise

and we found a beach

Sun bathers

I don’t know, sitting out in the sun is not my idea of a good time.  And look at sign we saw there

Sign at beach

So there are only deadly rip currents to the left?  And who came up with that fine?  $1040.00?  That’s a weird amount.  Plus you have a bunch of other rules you have to obey

More signs at beach

Geez!  You just can’t have any fun anymore ☹.

After we drove around a bunch more, we headed back to the hotel.   As I was sitting in a chair in the room, I happened to glance up

What????C

“Contact with sprinkler will cause flooding”  Haha!  Holy hoot!  Who hangs up their clothes on a fire sprinkler?  Geez people, where is your common sense?  I’m always amazed at how stupid people can be.

Well, back to reality tomorrow.