Day 7 History and Horses

We read it in the Brochure. Camden is all about Hospitality, History, and Horses. Also, Buddy told us. We had experienced plenty of Hospitality. And now on our very last full day in Camden we were due to get our dose of Camden (yes, the oldest inland town in South Carolina) History and Horses.


We started out with History.

A trip down to Historic Camden to learn more about the beginnings of the oldest inland town of South Carolina. The children were naughty so I had to lock them up.

Our visit was cut short by a dramatic dinosaur drenching downpour. We rushed back to our tent where we had left all the windows open to dry the tent out from the night before. Don't ask.

When we had dried out our camp for the second time that day, we went out for a walk in the woods.

And then we moved on to Horses...

We were honored to have jockey lessons from Hope Cooper, director of the National Steeplechase Museum. 

And then by 2 actual steeplechase jockeys!

 

I think they're worried about the competition.


And then Hope brought us off to visit the kennels of the Camden Hunt. And we were met by Camden Hunt Master of Foxhounds, Sue Sensor, who introduced us to the hounds! English Foxhounds and Pennmarydel Foxhounds and hybrids. Fantastic. One of my favorites was a hound named Dragon.

 We were even lucky enough to meet the newest members of the pack, six week old pups!

"I'm a hound dog!" Name that movie.
Yes, the kids watched it in the back of the car at one point on our trip.

We dropped in briefly at the Equine Center to check out the horse show in town. The kids were impressed to see kids their own ages competing on their ponies in the hunter class.

The evening held an art show opening for artist, Katie Walker, at the Fine Arts Center of Kershaw County as well as the opening night of Camden's Jazz festival!

And we finished the day with the kids latest second favorite restaurant (second, because nothing can now top Waffle House), Chili's! Please, nobody tell the kids they exist up north too. And yes, the kids discovered the southern joy of free drink refills while we were down there too!

What a day!

RoadTrip part 2

You may remember way way long ago, last month, I was posting about our adventure of a road trip to South Carolina. Well, here's how it all finished up...

Day 6  Daytrip to Charleston.

We went down to Charleston for the day. What a beautiful town! And we enjoyed it immensely. I'm afraid, though, that we did not do it justice. There was so much there to do. We wandered around and enjoyed the scenery. And we took a carriage ride tour. And got ice cream. A good day out!

 

The girls favorite part of the whole vacation was opening and closing the gate.

This was usually Carys' special project. But sometimes Solenn joined in.

 Along the way we found some of last years cotton fields. I was so excited I pulled over on the side of the road and made everyone get out to look. The kids were less impressed. I may have even received an eye roll or two.

They were much more impressed with the roadkill I stopped to show them. I'm not in the habit of stopping to show the kids roadkill. But this time I had to. It was a giant wild boar. The size of a bear. I swear. Didn't get any eye rolls on that one!

But cotton: booooriiing.

 

The horse behind us on line at the carriage ride.

Sorry. Not many pictures today! All pictured out.

Day 7 coming up shortly...

Working backwards...

Ok. I seem to have a few unfinished stories out here...

People want to know where I am and why did I move to South Carolina.

Short answer: I'm here and I didn't.

And people want to know what happened to the pigeon!

Short answer: Pigeon is all gone and I'm sad, but Solenn's not.

Stay tuned!

For now, here's our now annual New Canaan St Mark's May Fair photo: