We left Durham about 9 and headed south on route 1 missing route 40 and 95 for the trip south. Route 1 is a freeway for about 50 miles and then turns into four lanes divided and then into a gently rolling two-laner with little towns, and slowing speed limits. As you cross the pahnee wuhds of North Carolina, you glimpse the gorgeous golf courses centered around Pinehurst and realize what a boon they are to the local economy, otherwise dependent on the pines in them thar woods.
There are dramatic visuals of poverty and wealth. Manufactured housing is scattered along the roadside, old pickup trucks, and sketchy gardens, with magnificent stretches of pines and side roads leading to the large houses. Each of the towns has well-designated good sections and badsections, generally on each side of the "downtown"---though those centers are generally vacant storefronts done in by the local Walmarts, I should guess.
The countryside generally undulates, its being piedmont, and is often pretty but never grand. The homes are often surrounded by banks of flowering azaleas and some dogwood. Spring flowers, though, are all gone. There are some pretty lupines along the road.
We stopped in a tiny crossroads of a town for lunch, Sonny's in McBee,SC. Sonny's, according to the waitress, had been owned by a clown collector--much as we collect hedgehogs. But he had filled the walls of his restaurant with clown dolls, circus posters, pictures, cartoons, and masques. Clearly the sign outside got our interest because we backtracked to lunch there. A fine diner lunch: a sub with ham, pepperoni and salami for John and a grilled chicken salad for Ben. $13, Not bad. A place obviously frequented by a wide variety of townsfolk from the real estate ladies to the plumbers mates. As we were leaving a state forester pulled up in her SUV to pick up her sandwich. Very thick Carolina accents made it even more charmin'.
We spent the afternoon exploring Columbia. Yes, we found a coffee shop with acceptable cappucino for Ben, called the Immaculate Consumption, on Sumter Street. My latte was fine.
Then to the State Capitol for a tour along with two full classes of third graders doing their South Carolina history trip.
Fun to watch them. Bright kids with bright questions. The Capitol is a fine old building.completed in 1906 after various misfortunes, including being blasted by Sherman's cannonballs during the Civil War when he burned Columbia. Of course there are statues everywhere, including Strom Thurmond. A fine guide who is still learning her craft. Not quite the guide we had in Montgomery three years ago. But she's mebbe 25, and he was certainly 65. The State honors its black citizens as well as whites. The African American memorial was quite moving, including the stowage formation for the slave ships.
We walked back through the University of South Carolina campus, through the famed Horseshoe of buildings that make up their version of Harvard yard.
The architecture is not grand, mostly Georgian, but the plantings are beautiful and there is an air of a fine university about the place. At the museum we saw a show on African American baskets and had the pleasure of meeting a basketeer. She's the daughter or grand daughter of the old ladies who used to make baskets on the main street in Charleston where we visited 22 years ago. I am going to see if I have any scannable pictures from our visit of her ancestors when we get home.We had a glass of cava on the Inn at USC's verandah, listening in on some prosecutors' discussion of the Goldman Sachs derivatives case, which Ben is following with some interest.
We decided that we wanted something light for dinner, so examined the guidebooks in the hotel (The Inn at USC is a very good hotel). The Vista Congaree area of downtown about ten minutes walk hosts two oyster bars. We set out to find them. Raining a bit, but not unpleasantly cold, we found the Oyster Bar Columbia. As we were looking over the menu, a local woman recommended it highly, saying her husband had had the scallops and she the shrimp. With a recommendation like that, how could we refuse to enter.
The OBC is a bit of a physical dump, a long circular bar with several shuckers and servers behind it, but the food was superb. Turns out that our server was a construction equipment salesman by day working nights as a shucker. He knew his job.
The oysters come from Galveston Bay and were huge. About three inches (7 cm) long and juicy. Not quite so delicate a taste as French belon oysters from Brittany, but very very good. We followed a dozen of them with gumbo, excellent, and then some shrimp and scallops with some steamed veggies. A wonderful meal, washed down with a couple of Stiner Texas bock beers.
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