McClellanville SC June 17-18

June here: What a charming shrimping town populated by 500 super-friendly folk and replete with

low country history.  We docked at Leland Marina after a 5 hour ride from Charleston.

Typical view on the Intercoastal Waterway in South Carolina.

Shrimp boats in McClellanville, SC

 We scurried over to Carolina Seafood located next to the shrimp boat dock to get their renowned shrimp and crab dips before they closed at 5 pm.  Next came a pleasant short walk with our boating buddies from Once Upon a Time (St. Paul MN/Brunswick GA folk) to the equally-renowned T.W. Graham Restaurant, which lived up to its reputation.

The seafood lasagne special was perfection, as were the homemade pies and whipped cream.

A Sunday morning stroll took us past the 1889 St. James Episcopal Santee Chapel of Ease where the pastor, organist and several ladies invited us to come worship, assuring us that it was fine to arrive in our very casual dress and bring a dog along if we'd like. 

 One of our friends from Once Upon a Time did indeed attend the service later that morning and reported that folks clad in shorts were in attendance, as was one very well-behaved black lab.

 There is art to be found in McClellanville, where the Arts Center sports a non-digital community bulletin board.  We also came across what I thought at first was more local art, but was in fact an 8th graders' project showing the detritus pulled from local waters.




Eighth graders' plea for cleaner waters.

A little  farther along our walk, an elderly (even by our standards) gentleman came along in a golf cart and we asked him a question about the town.  Graciously, he said "hop on board and I'll show you around."  We did, and he did.  Among other things, we learned that McClellanville was the home of Archibald Rutledge 1883-1973) , South Carolina's first poet laureate, who was born and died in the same log house along the street pictured below, which was destroyed along with much of the town in 1992's Hurricane Hugo.