Four days, four hundred churches, one very good biscuit

Hi ,

There's a version of Craig and me that exists only in Charleston.

We were young, we were broke, and we had absolutely no business being in one of the most beautiful cities in America with nothing but a backpack and a nearly-maxed credit card. We did the horse and carriage ride because it was the one splurge we could justify. We walked the Battery in the early morning before anyone else was up. We ate wherever looked cheap and good. And somewhere between the church steeples and the wrought-iron gates and the smell of the harbor at low tide, Charleston got into us.

It became one of our favorite cities in the US. One of the quiet reasons we eventually chose to plant ourselves in Raleigh — the knowledge that this place was just under four hours away whenever we needed it.

That was before kids. Before yTravel Blog. Before we knew what we didn't know about this city.

This time, Craig, Savannah, and I went back with time and intention. We did the food tour that rewrote everything we thought we understood about Southern cooking — turns out the story starts 4,000 years ago and runs through hurricanes, rice fields, and a bowl of she-crab soup that ended up on the White House menu. We took the Gullah tour and came away with a completely different understanding of the ironwork gates, the blue-painted porch ceilings, and the language that gave us the word "kumbaya." We ate biscuits at Callie's and didn't apologize to anyone.

Charleston kept surprising us. It does that.

I've written up everything — four full days, the tours worth booking, where to eat, where to stay, how to do the Ashley River Road drive on the way home — over on the blog.

Read the full guide: 4 Days in Charleston, SC

If Charleston is already on your list, I hope this gets you there. And if it's not on your list yet — consider this your nudge.

Until next time,

Caroline

P.S. Stories and Reels on Instagram will be published soon!