CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA — Lauren Mossberg

My girlfriends from college and I decided to spend MLK weekend in Charleston. I was stoked because (a) prior to this trip I had never been to South Carolina, so this was going to be one more state visited on my quest to hit all 50 and (b) I’ve had Charleston on my ‘want to go’ list for a while now.

It was a relatively last-minute trip, by my standards at least. We started exploring what to do and where to eat in late December, so I knew some restaurant reservations were going to be out of the question.

Fri Jan 13

I landed at CHS with a couple of my friends. Some took other flights based on airport and timing. The Charleston airport is small, so we were in a Lyft in no time, headed for the Emeline hotel. It’s a boutique hotel in downtown Charleston, close to the French Quarter, and wow, it’s a gorgeous hotel. The interior design, the curated shop, the cafe, the restaurant, the bar, all of it! And it even had a furnished patio area where, if it was warmer, we would have spent a lot more time. For five of us ladies we booked their Collective room, which was two king bedrooms and a pull out in the living room. It was perfect because we didn’t feel cramped at all.

After checking in and dropping our bags in the room, we headed out on a walk through the South of Broad area and the waterfront. We saw the Pineapple Fountain and stumbled upon Maris DeHart, an adorable boutique. After a little shopping, we walked through the Charleston City Market on our way back to the hotel. We grabbed coffees from Clerk’s Coffee Company in the lobby, then went upstairs to change. One oyster-loving friend and I went to Pearlz Oyster Bar for happy hour: raw oysters, oyster shooters, and char-broiled oysters. The happy hour prices were a great deal, and I was hungry at that point.

We met the rest of the ladies at Hank’s for dinner. I thought it was delicious (I got shrimp and grits), but I also had a couple cocktails and oyster shooters in me. After dinner, we crossed the parking lot to go to Henry’s On The Market. It’s a three-story bar with a different live band on each floor. I can’t recommend it enough. We had so much fun! The bars all close around 2am, so it wasn’t a super late night, at least compared to New York City.

Sat Jan 14

Some of my friends (myself included) are early-ish risers and some can sleep in endlessly, so breakfast at the hotel seemed like the easiest idea. And we hadn’t made any big boozy brunch plans for the weekend. We grabbed seats at the bar at Frannie & The Fox.

After breakfast, we grabbed a Lyft out to Magnolia Plantation. We walked around the gardens and took a tour through the historic house. The grounds were beautiful, but I think it would have been more picturesque in the spring, when the flowers and trees are blooming. I also would have loved to stay for the Slavery to Freedom tour, but we were ready to leave. It was sunny, but chilly, and some of the ladies were getting too cold.

We headed to Firefly Distillery, where I hoped we could hop into the next tasting. They said they were booked (first come, first served) and so we were slotted for an hour later. We found a table, got comfy, and grabbed a couple drinks while we waited. One of the women at the front had said something to the effect of ‘in two drinks’ time, you’ll be in the tasting’, and she was spot on. Firefly makes different flavored vodka, whiskey, rum, gin, and moonshine, so the cocktail list was funky. I had never tried moonshine before and … yum!

After a couple drinks we were called for our tasting, which I cannot rave about enough. It was only $13 for 6 shots of their various spirits plus a take home souvenir shot glass. It was the most funfilled thirty minutes I think we had all weekend. The two women who hosted the tasting were hilarious.

Our tipsy crew of five headed back to Emeline to change and relax before dinner at Bourbon N’ Bubbles. We had a pretty bad experience, which I won’t elaborate on. Perhaps we caught them on a bad night. After dinner, we just spent quality time together at the hotel: first the bar, and then in our room.

Sun Jan 15

Everybody was hungry for breakfast when we woke up on Sunday. The earlier risers headed out to Harken Cafe, which was too crowded. The line was growing down the block. We walked a block further to The Black Door Cafe. We didn’t need or want anything fancy, just coffees, breakfast sandwiches, and pastries. Black Door is in another beautiful hotel, which I thought was boutique until I looked it up. It’s inside the Mills House Charleston, which is a Hilton property. Gorgeous!

This day was our big walking and shopping day, so once we were fueled up, we headed out. Our first stop was Rainbow Row to see all the pretty houses. One of our Lyft drivers told us about a theory on how they got their colors. He said Charleston is a military town and in the 1930’s the houses (which all look identical, sans-color) were painted so that drunk sailors would find their way home easier.

We wandered through the Charleston City Market again and up and down King Street. I swear we went into every boutique that we passed. They all had such cute stuff! Once we shopped up an appetite, we sat down at Frannie & The Fox for a light lunch of shared pizzas and salads and a punch bowl, or two (YOLO!). The afternoon vibe as awesome because they had a DJ. I’m not sure whether he stayed into dinner service.

We had a couple hours to relax around the hotel before we started getting ready for dinner. This night was our ‘fancy night’. We were heading to Gabrielle in the Hotel Bennett. Most of us opted for the Restaurant Week menu. The food was good, not great. It didn’t knock anybody’s socks off. Maybe because it was a Sunday or maybe because we sat down on the later side, the restaurant vibe was off. Perhaps the hotel was just a little too snoody for our taste.

After dinner, we went to The Commodore to listen to some live music. It was a recommendation from a local friend of one of my girlfriends. And the vibe was definitely ‘local’. The band was great, and the drinks were cheap, but it didn’t compare to Henry’s on Friday night.

Mon Jan 16

Our last morning in Charleston! We all got dressed in our matching Charleston crewnecks (oh yeah) and went out for a walk while we Googled where we could sit down for brunch. We walked by the John Rutledge House, the Old Marine Hospital, and the Old Charleston Jail. We were able to snag a table at Millers All Day. I’m sure there were more historic buildings to see, but we were hungry to sit down and not in the mood to read up on every house we passed. Millers All Day really hit the spot! They have a big diner-style menu where everybody found something they wanted. And we shared the pimento cheese ball because we’d never seen or tried one before: not bad!

I really enjoyed my weekend in Charleston. I would love to return when the weather is warmer and plan a trip far enough in advance to get reservations at a few places we weren’t able to go to. I was dying to sit down at Leon’s or 167Raw, but we didn’t have time to wait for a table at either. I also wish we got a dinner reservation at Husk or The Ordinary. And I wanted to get cocktails at Dalila’s and The Cocktail Club. I also had Rodney Scott’s BBQ and Lewis Barbecue flagged on my map and we didn’t make it there. I’ll be back!