On to Charleston and Buck Hall

We make a detour to Kiawah Island, a stop at a disappointing Harvest Hosts farm and on to Buck Hall campground.

We left Skidaway Island this morning and headed toward Charleston, SC. Our original destination for the day was Legere Farms on Johns Island, south of Charleston, so we decided to take the back route. After going back through downtown Savannah, the shortest way out to the north, we got back on US 17 but soon left it when it turned inland to follow the Okatie Highway, a series of state roads that go more directly towards Charleston, until we rejoined US 17 north of Beaufort. This took us to the road to Johns Island and Kiawah Island in time for lunch.

There just happened to be a seafood restaurant, Gilligan's Steamer and Raw Bar. We stopped there. We passed on the daily special, all-you-can-eat steamed oysters, but had the fried ones (what else would we order on this trip?). They were quite good, large and creamy and just enough of them. Ellen struck gold with the cheesy grits as a side dish, as my fries were a little too soft for my taste.

It was still quite early, so we decided to visit Kiawah Island, hoping to find a cafe for an afternoon coffee before going on to today's destination. It was a ride through the countryside to the edge of Kiawah Island and Freshfields Village, a shopping center built to look like a village. The only place I've ever seen like it was Celebration, FL, the Disney-built "town" outside Disney World. But we did find a cafe with pretty good coffee and a grocery along the lines of Fresh Market in Hingham.

Refueled, it was back to Johns Island and Legere Farms. Since we weren't able to reserve a site at Buck Hall along the Intra-coastal Waterway in Francis Marion National Forest, our next long-term stop, we loked for something else near Charleston. For the last year, we have subscribed to Harvest Hosts, a site that offers overnight parking stays at vineyards and farms. As an almost last resort,we looked there and found a listing for Legere Farms on Johns Island, about 15 miles south of Charleston. We looked them up online and they have quite an impressive web site, offering home-grown vegetables, beef, pork from heritage pigs, chicken and eggs. It has been in the same family since 1725 and list a CSA and various educational programs. It sounded like a cross between Holly Hill Farm in Cohasset and Weir River Farm in Hingham.

Imagine our disappointment when we pulled into a dusty messy yard with an office in an old stained shipping container. Not an animal or planted vegetable field to be seen (and we'd passed quite a few planted fields on the roads through the island). The place for Harvest Host visitors was a large open grass parking lot with overgrown fields around it. We decided not to stay.

After a bit of discussion, we decided to press on to Buck Hall, in the event that there might be a cancellation and an available site. If one wasn't available, there are a couple of primitive campgrounds in the National Forest. We arrived at Buck Hall late in the afternoon and lucked out.   A campsite had freed up due to an early departure and we took it.

Time to relax with a walk around the area and a relaxing dinner...inside Speedy this evening as the weather was deteriorating.