historic homes/plantation tours - if you only had time for 1

If you only had time for one plantation/museum/historic home tour which would you recommend?

Thanks!

historic homes/plantation tours - if you only had time for 1

Here%26#39;s my thoughts:

If you have a car and...

into ';preservation';, it%26#39;s Drayton Hall.

into ';restoration';, it%26#39;s Middleton Place.

Both of these are on Hwy 61 and easily doable in 1 day...stop at Drayton Hall 1st, then hit Magnolia Plantation for lunch (great restaurant) and then tour. Drayton Hall doesn%26#39;t have furniture in it and no electricity (just like in its heyday).

If you don%26#39;t have a car and...

into ';preservation';, it%26#39;s the Aiken-Rhett House

into ';restoration';, it%26#39;s the Edmonston-Alston House.

Both are downtown...Aiken-Rhett is on Elizabeth St near the Visitors Center and the Edmonston-Alston is on South Battery.

Happy Travels!

historic homes/plantation tours - if you only had time for 1

Middleton Place would be my first choice but it is not something that you see in just a few minutes. Be sure to do a house tour but I would skip the carriage ride. Allow half the day then have lunch either in the restaurant or a picnic under the oaks. They have sandwiches and picnic type foods at the Garden Market near the parking area.

For a quick (about 30 minutes) house museum tour, I would do either the Edmonston-Alston House or the Nathaniel-Russell House.

If you are mainly interested in seeing the interior of a home, any of the downtown houses previously mentioned would be a good choice.

At Middleton, I think the gardens are amazing. The house (which not the original main home, but a side building) contains a lot of interesting artifacts from the Middleton family; but it is not particularly illustrative of what life would have been like before the original home was destroyed.

Hate to disagree with SCBlossom, but I found the carriage ride (actually a big wagon drawn by very big horses) at Middleton to be fascinating. I learned a lot about the economics and life of a massive rice plantation.

We will be in Charleston in May. We did a road trip last September and spent an about 6 hours there and fell in love. Decided that an extended weekend back there was definitely in order. I fell in love with the place!!!

That being said, we will have a rental car so getting around will be no issue. We are staying at Charleston Place. From the hotel, how far of a drive is it to Middleton Place (and the other plantations)? And I LOVE exploring while driving, so while on the way to Middleton, Magnolia or Drayton.....are there other things we might want to stop and see?

I%26#39;m so excited! Ohhhh and not sure if anyone agrees with me, but we %26#39;accidentally%26#39; fell upon Jestine%26#39;s Kitchen during that afternoon we were there.....the food was SOOOO good! I can%26#39;t wait for an afternoon lunch there again.

For me it would be Magnolia. Love the secret gardens, the use of the river as scenery, the swamp boardwalk, even the ';petting zoo';.

For something completely different I have to say the Boone Hall is underrated. The avenue of oaks is second to none and although the home is not the original one it is historic and lovely. The fact that it has been in continuous use as a plantation is impressive to me too. (Oh, and if you can go when the story teller is there, what a bonus! He%26#39;s awesome!!!)

So little time for so many great choices! My vote is not to spend time driving to Middleton or Magnolia or Cypress. Walk around downtown, peek into the alleys and gardens, read the plaques about the buildings--get the real flavor of Charleston. If you want to do one home, I would make it the Aiken-Rhett house. The restored homes like Nathaniel Russell and Edmonston-Alston are fantastic if you%26#39;re into architecture and period furnishing, and the family histories are interesting--they are well worth doing--but Aiken-Rhett is special. If you can walk the steps into the slave quarters without thinking of how many times those steps had been tread and getting goosebumps, you%26#39;ve got no soul.

Culturehound,

Thanks for the info! I think I%26#39;m torn between a couple. I%26#39;ll have to see if we can maybe take a day and tour a couple different ones.

Laurel, we were in Charleston back in Sepember for a day (during a road trip) and that%26#39;s why we are going back for a few days. We fell in love with the downtown area and walked down the streets falling in love with the houses, the Market, the Battery and the stores downtown. I think we put miles and miles on our feet and now we want to put those same miles on again, but this time at a much slower pace. :)

Thanks for the help folks!

That%26#39;s how we got hooked - our first visit was too short, the next one a day or two longer, the next 10 were longer still, and now we live here! :) This area never gets ';old'; (wow - I was just hit with the irony!) there is always something new to do.