Jan. 13, 2014: Yesterday was a perfect winter day; the sun was shining, not a cloud in the sky, and the temperature was in the mid-50's--and the Patriots beat the Colts: 43 to 22. (We got to watch the game on our laptop on Saturday night. The three hour game ate up almost all of our scheduled monthly data usage on our Verizon plan, on the first day of the plan's new month. I contacted Verizon on Sunday morning to increase the data plan--otherwise I couldn't be doing this, the blog.)
We returned to Brookgreen Gardens to view the grounds and sculpture gardens in more comfortable weather than we had when we first visited the site six days ago. We were in the parking lot at 10:30; we didn't leave until 3:00. During that time we walked about three and a quarter miles--without even realizing it. Even though it is winter, it is still a spectacular place to walk. We imagine in the spring, the flowers must be out of this world--we could see huge beds of daffodils and tulips already sending up green shoots. We did see two flowering trees already blooming; one was a camellia, the other I'm not sure what it was, except that it was pink. This park covers many acres, but the paths are easy to walk in--and they provide strollers for people who have difficulty walking.
Besides the gardens, fountains, and outdoor sculptures, they also have a section telling the history of the low country plantations. There is a large rice field, the site of the plantations slave quarters, and a small museum which we found very interesting. The floor of the museum in covered with an aerial photograph of the low country in this part of South Carolina, between Myrtle Beach and Winjah Bay. Also, in the exhibit was a story about a southern lady, Rachel Allston, who once owned Brookgreen. She was married to a William Allston, who died, leaving her with six children and a plantation. She ran the plantation for three years. She then married a Dr. H. C. Flagg of Rhode Island. He had moved to South Carolina with the Continental Army. When her family objected to her marrying a northerner, she replied that she had married William Allston to please the family, now she was marrying Dr. Flagg to please herself. The card said she lived at Brookgreen until 1800. The card did not say how long  Dr. Flagg survived in the marriage.
On the grounds, there are two zoo sections; one showing farm animals that would have been kept on the plantation, the other showing animals native to area. In this section is an aviary built over a cypress swamp. Inside the netted enclosure, a large number of wading bird are free to fly within the area, or to walk on the walkway provided for us humans. It is an opportunity to see these birds up close--and almost personal. Some of the birds we saw in the aviary were: Black-crowned Night Heron, Great Blue Heron,White Ibis, Great Egret, and Cattle Egret--one of these came up to a woman standing ahead of us and picked off a small insect that was on her jeans.
Near the zoo area, there is also a unbelievable children's playground with a large number of amazing things for them to play on: among them a pirate ship, small playhouses, and a castle.
We stopped for a nice lunch, sandwich, beer/wine, and pecan pie, at the "Old Kitchen," on the grounds, near the sculpture center.
B and I would recommend that anyone visiting this area of South Carolina stop at this Garden. The price is reasonable and the tickets are good for seven days.
Today was B's birthday--a nice quiet day with a great lunch at a seafood shack, in Murrells Inlet, called Graham's Landing. She had grilled oysters, littlenecks; I had low country stew--a spicy mix of chicken, shrimp, rice, tomato, and andouille sausage--crab cake. But this wasn't enough, so we shared a pound of low country shrimp boil.