In a town as small as Charleston, you never expect to see many sights. It seems to be like Sintra in Portugal, where you can visit several palaces, castles, the ocean and Cape Roca, in addition to the city itself. In Charleston, there are palaces, plantations, museums, churches, forts, beaches, ocean and much more.
And the streets themselves are steeped in history: just there you can get a sense of what colonialism is all about, and understand why 4.5 million people a year come here from other states and even other countries.
Top 5
Rainbow Row. A must-see place if even you happen to drop by Charleston and haven’t heard or read anything about it. Rainbow Row is an ensemble of 13 colonial-style houses that were built by local merchants back in the 18th century. The lower floors were used as trading quarters and the upper floors were residential. Some of these houses were damaged in a fire in 1778 and were rebuilt later. After the Civil War, this part of Charleston was abandoned, and it was not until the 1920s, thanks to the head of the Charleston Preservation Society, that work began to renovate the houses, which was not completed until 1945.It was during this period that the houses were painted in pastel colors in the Caribbean style.
Fort Sumter is the epitome of U.S. history, with its endless confrontation between the South and the North. It is the beginning of the America we know now.
Magnolia Plantation and its gardens. It is Charleston’s oldest plantation and one of the most beautiful. Worth spending a few hours on.
Boonehole Plantation. Also one of the oldest and, according to the owners, the most photographed plantation in the United States. Read more about Boonehole and Magnolia and its gardens below in the section on plantations.
The South Carolina Aquarium will add variety to your vacation and show how beautiful wildlife can be that is usually hidden from our eyes by the restless sea.