1 Night in Beaufort, SC

1 Night in Beaufort, SC

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Stats for May 10, 2019

Origin: Hilton Head

Destination: Beaufort, SC (Bew-fert)

Distance: 20.7 miles

Speed: 8 mph

Time on the Move: 2 hours and 34 minutes

We passed through some big open water heading to Beaufort, but it was a calm day so easy cruising. Mike noticed that we passed through an area where there thousands of jellyfish floating in the water. We just kept passing through more and more of them!! Later we heard that they aren’t a type that can sting and they are called cannonball jellyfish.

You can see a handful of them in this picture.
Tobin gave me this early Mother’s Day picture. I love that I’m covered in hearts!! He used to make everyone bald, so one day I suggested that he add hair. Now I’m not sure hair was the best suggestion. Everyone he draws has crazy hair like this!!

There are 2 free day docks in Beaufort, so of course we tied up to one. Cities that have these day docks are so smart!! What a great way to draw cruisers in to explore and spend money in their towns!!

We went to explore town and found ourselves going on a horse-drawn carriage tour right away. It was a good way to get the lay of the land and learn about the history of the town.

This was our horse Silver. He tried eating part of a tree at one stop sign along the way, and Tobin must have thought that was funny because he wanted to make sure I put it in the blog.
The carriage tour was a great way to relax while we saw the town!!

We saw many antebellum homes on our tour and heard a lot of history of the homes and the area. Many of them have been used in and inspired movies. Our tour guide told us that success of island long staple cotton made Beaufort the wealthiest place in the country between 1800-1860.

It was interesting to learn that in the Battle of Port Royal the residents of Beaufort understood that they would be easily overpowered when the Union soldiers came to town, 12,000 deep, so they gave up the town willingly and packed up and left essentially overnight. Only the slaves were left behind (and the residents were worried that all 10,000 of them would revolt and join the union–which many of them did). Union soldiers took over many of the homes to be used as hospitals. Later, when the war was over, the residents had to buy their homes back and many of them couldn’t afford it, so they moved elsewhere.

We saw more of the haint blue paint on the underside of porch ceilings and learned that people from the Gullah culture (mostly southern slaves in this area) did not like large windows in rooms where they slept because they thought spirits would come through them at night. That is why they painted doors and windowsills in the haint blue color.
This house had a separate kitchen house that the owner buried his money under before he left town at the time of the Union occupation. The kitchen house was used by the Union as a morgue during the war. After the war, the man came back and found his money under the kitchen house, just as he had left it. He was one of the lucky ones that had enough money to re-buy his home.
Nothing too special about this fence, but I just thought the flowers against the wall were so beautiful.

Harriet Tubman was a nurse and a spy for the Union army and worked in one of these houses. She knew the wilderness in the area so well that she led the Union army on several attacks and used slaves along the Underground Railroad as spies to keep an eye on the Confederate soldiers. Due to it’s early Union occupation, many slaves came to Beaufort seeking freedom. The Union granted them emancipation. Some Union gunboats even helped move slaves to freedom in the north.

There was a big fire here in the 1907 that burned many historic homes. This home was burned down, but the owners left the stairway that led to the previous house. After that a historical society was created to save the remaining antebellum homes.

We had dinner in town and played in the grassy park along the river. There are many swings lining the river’s edge and it was a great place to relax and take in the scenery. There was a college graduation happening at one end of the park, so it was a busy place!! We were treated to this sunset from the free dock while we watched a family movie.

There are large tides in this area, too. Check out that low water!

Even though the free dock had a sign stating no overnight dockage, we decided to stay overnight. In other places we haven’t been bothered overnight. Those rules are mostly to keep derelict boats and local liveaboards from staying at the docks for weeks and months at a time. This time our decision to stay came back to bite us when we had a police officer knocking on the side of our boat at 3 am. He was very nice, but was not budging on the idea that we needed to move off the dock or we would be fined $1,000. So we fired up the radar and the engines and moved about 1/4 mile off the dock to the other side of the river and dropped our anchor. The next morning we moved right back to the free dock for easy access for a few more hours.

After we were tied up in our same spot on the free dock, Mike got the bikes off and replaced Tobin’s tube. We rode around the parking lot of the park for a while to help Tobin get the feel of riding again and then set off for a bike trail nearby. Tobin is still using training wheels, but after a few weeks of practice, he will be ready to lose those bad boys. We rode about 7 miles total, with our miles on the bike trail the most comfortable and easy. After ditching the bikes, we went in search of ice cream on another walk through town.

It was a hot ride!!
The view from the park. This is the bridge that Forrest Gump ran over in the movie. They simply put up a sign saying “Mississippi River” for the movie.
Look at this beautiful walkway lining the river with swings all along the edge. It was a great spot!
The little red-roofed building is where we had dinner, and this is the field the kids played in the night before.

We loved the history and relaxed, inviting atmosphere in Beaufort. It was a great stop, but since we couldn’t stay on the dock overnight anyway, we were ready to move on. Thanks for reading and following our adventures!!

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