Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

You *could be* if you had a new calendar!

When I did a closing for the Beltline J. Peters a few weeks ago, I linked to this Greenville News story which led me to believe that the J. Peters locations on the coast would continue unchanged.

This turns out not to be the case as the Litchfield Beach location closed, apparently a between one and two weeks ago. I can see why this location might have been on the block as it is not visible from US-17, and there is a Pawleys Island location directly fronting on US-17 just a few miles south (in the old La Playa storefront).

If this storefront looks familiar, it may be because I did a closing on it in 2014, which it was Carolina Wings & Rib House.

Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

After not being able to go last year due to scheduling issues, I was afraid that this year would be a bust as well, since it had rained all day Friday, and was just starting to drizzle again as we pulled into the Gardens. Fortunately, that quickly petered out, and the rest of the night was rain free (though the ground was saturated as I found to my squishy discomfort a few times I steppted off the paths).

The basics of the festival stay the same year after year: Lights in a garden full of beautiful trees and sculpture, but they change it up a bit for each new edition. In particular, this year the boat full of glass balls was new as was the Hogwarts train setting.

I learned something interesting about taking pictures of LED Christmas lights: Even though these are not "blinking" lights, if you push your shutter speed high enough, you may well catch the instant when they are off. This did not happen with the old incandescent bulbs. I'm not sure exactly what the mechanism is. I would have said they go on and off 60 times a second with the AC frequency, but clearly in some pictures one strand is off and another is not.

One thing the preceding days of rain did do was keep the temperature at a comfortable level. There have been years where I could barely work the camera because my fingers were numb, but not this year!

There are two days of the lights left: Saturday 22 December & Sunday 23 December. If you are in the area, you definitely should go. Tickets are at https://www.brookgreen.org/.

(If I get the time, I may go back and add some videos of the train setups).

Read the rest of this entry »

Joe Loves was the follow-on in this location to The Ship's Pub, which was the follow-on to Sam's Corner for which the building was built.

I noticed Joe Loves around New Years of 2018, and according to The Hilton Head Island Packet, it had opened here on 5 December 2017. What I did not know was that it had actually relocated from Ridgeland, which, if you look at the map, is quite a good distance away.

Given that the real estate sign mentions that the fixtures are all in place, I expect to see another restaurant here before too long.

The Chapel has been scheduled for a move for a good while now, as storm damage must be repaired, but ongoing weddings delayed the event until after New Years.

The Chapel was very little above high water even during normal tides. During spring or storm tides, the situation was worse, but initially the plan was not to raise it at all, as the permits would only allow for fixing the pilings at the existing height. My understanding is that this changed late in the game, so perhaps when the building is moved back, it will sit at a slightly more secure level.

Ship's Pub was the follow on to Sam's Corner in this Pawleys Island/Litchfield location. I never ate there but I would notice the building driving by, and it seems to me it closed last fall, and that I saw a truck carting stuff off in November.

Now it is open again, this time as Joe Loves Lobster Rolls, which is rather interesting as lobster is not normally associated with the South Carolina coast.

UPDATE 23 February 2018: Added top picture from 17 January 2016 of the place open.