Travel Report – Page 32 – The Hermits' Rest

Sartorial Strategies

Here’s a quick one for you. Have you ever just been standing around, waiting in a line or a queue, when something about yourself hits you like a lightning bolt? I have, and it happened this morning when I was checking out and back in for another couple of days in South Carolina (more on that later).

I was just looking at the people in the incredibly echo-filled check-in area at the resort, and I realized I was the only person there wearing jeans and a t-shirt. Whoa. I am no longer the typical American wearing the typical American uniform.

What were people wearing? One couple had sweatpants outfits on, top and bottoms the same color. They looked comfy, but to me looked like they were wearing their pajamas.

The only place I’d wear this outfit. Image by *@haehanna via Twenty20*.

Two other groups were decked out in what I guess are track suits? I don’t know much about those. People tend to wear very bright ones with the names of shoe manufacturers all over them, along with giant shoes with the manufacturer name or symbol on them. I just don’t feel authentic in those outfits, not being a runner. Of course, many people I see in those outfits do not appear to be runners, either. On the other hand, these could also be warm-up outfits from other sports, since a lot of the people so attired look like they could be basketball, baseball, soccer, or lacrosse players (depending on accessories and hair, I guess).

I’m sure these track-suit guys are a team, a boy band, or something.

I’m at the beach, so others were wearing shorts (even though it is not hot outside), and still others were in bathing attire, which is a whole other topic. The see-through pants and tunic is very popular here. I am not going to share an image of these, because they tend to hurt my eyes, but I’m sure the wearers and their partners enjoy them.

Back to jeans. I’ve always worn them, pretty much every day unless I am going to a fancy function, wearing a dress to work in the olden days (with leggings; no one is to see my legs), or wearing shorts around the house. I do wear yoga pants to do yoga, and have one pair that passes for dress pants (I used to own a lot of non-jeans pants, but I no longer need them for work).

Even my avatars wear jeans. This one has a jean jacket, too.

I have come to the realization that I have never worn sweatpants outside my house, at least that I can recall. It could be because they make me look like a pile of crumpled laundry. I’m not sure, but that does not make me “average” these days! I think, perhaps, it’s time for me to go back to rural Texas, where at least ranchers dress more like me. Oh my gosh, I’ve become rural.

My other jean-clad avatar. I realize none of these really look like me.

Sadly, or maybe not, we extended our trip two more days, so that we can be more sure to have enough gasoline to get us home. I will be doing a lot more work from the car next week, but I can handle it. I think I can even plug my laptop in and use my phone for a hotspot. Rock on, me.

So, is anyone else stuck in the 70s like me? Or is it the 60s? I did always want to be a hippie as a little kid, so that may explain my attachment to good old jeans and t-shirts!

Nope, not me. Image by *@tcboncore via Twenty20*.

PS: I do own a few, but I am not fond of hoodies, either. All that material in the back is uncomfortable when you are sitting in a chair or couch, in my humble opinion.

PPS: Subsequent boardwalk observations revealed that there is a group of people who wear jeans and t-shirts here: women in their 60s. Oh. That’s me. Old.

Nature Is the Best Medicine

I’m feeling a little better, and it’s for two good reasons: I got out in nature AND I got to eat something, finally, at 2 pm (oops, one should remember to eat). I should have known spending all day cooped up in the condo yesterday wasn’t the best thing for my delicate sensibilities.

Seeing a real beach bunny would cheer anyone up!

We finally drug ourselves out of the house, and I told Lee I had to eat before we went to a park. That was harder than you’d think, because most of the restaurants on the west side of the main road closed during COVID. We eventually did a U-turn and decided it was about time to eat at one of those pancake restaurants.

The first open one we found was the Plantation Pancake House, which made me just as uncomfortable as attending Plantation High School did, but, to be honest, the restaurant IS on a former plantation. What a charming, nostalgic place this was. It opened in the early 70s, and I don’t think there’s been any redecorating since then. However, it was sparkling clean and had lovely healthy hanging plants throughout.

Our food was all freshly cooked by the very nice cook (I know this, because he was chatting with customers and hugging the servers). But what made me feel like I had gone back in time was how the staff interacted. They were so incredibly cheerful and helpful, toward patrons and each other. They seemed to truly like working there, like each other, and have pride in the restaurant. Watching the servers all cleaning and straightening the restaurant at the end of the day was a real pleasure. This was simply a nice, family place who treats the staff well (and they were old, young, black, white, and Hispanic).

After the victuals, we headed just a couple of miles down the road (not wanting to waste gas) and arrived at Myrtle Beach State Park. We had a blast at this place, which is the last piece of natural beach left on the Grand Strand. We first checked out the nature center, which was very entertaining, with aquariums and terrariums, plus a real friendly volunteer to chat with. We got to see a whelk out of its shell trundling along, a couple of types of crabs, and a beautiful rat snake. We spent a LOT of time at their really nice bird feeders, too. Click to see larger and uncropped photos.

Lee and I then embarked on a tour of all the heavily wooded nature trails. I was reminded of how incredibly varied the native hardwood forests on the east coast originally were. There were oaks, pines, cherries, sycamores, magnolias, dogwoods, hickories, and even native olives. It smelled so nice and woodsy. Click to see the pictures larger.

We enjoyed the smaller plants, too, and were happy to see ducks, turtles, skinks, and a lot of different kinds of dragonflies and damselflies. There were wetlands as well as drier parts, which gave me a chance to see so many new and familiar things. And the park is so well done! They have signs on the trail marking many of the common plants, with some facts about them. That really adds to the enjoyment, I think.

This was exactly what I needed for healing: nature to touch, feel, hear, see, and smell. You could still hear the motorcycles, but you could also hear dozens of kinds of birds. I did get surprised when fighter jets took off from the nearby airport. Those things are loud.

We are two happy campers now, and I happen to know Lee is going to get even happier later tonight! Stay tuned…

Time to Pivot!

It’s been gloomy and uncharacteristically cold over here on the Eastern Seaboard today. I think it’s a record cool day. But, that’s okay. We always have something to do. One of the things I had to do today was pivot on our plans and see if we can stay here at the ole condo longer than planned, to allow for the issues with fuel in this part of the country to settle down a bit.

People are so weird. They are lining up for gas, including putting dangerous amounts of it in their cars! We have the Gas Buddy app, so we’ll be able to find it, but still, driving a little later sounds like a good plan. I’m sort of ready to be gone, but this means maybe I can go to that state park later in the week, after all.

I’ve been working a bit today (you know, things come up), so I won’t feel too bad trying to work while driving again. At the moment, I could only get two extra days, but the guy at the desk said he bets people will be canceling their arrivals and we can maybe get another couple of days in. It won’t cost any more money up front, just cut down on future vacations. I’m glad I have a lot to knit and a lot of reading material!

Lee and I made it through the drizzle to get to eat at a seafood place on the pier near the condo for a late lunch, so at least we got outside.

I later wandered around the building to get some exercise and had a long talk with the bartender (who had no business at all). She’s going to graduate with an MA in education, and is all set to teach English at the local high school. It felt so good to be able to tell her how proud I am of her for choosing that career path and how much of an impact she will have on young people. It’s the kind of thing I wish I could tell my son. I love it that she said she never wants to be wealthy, just have meaningful work. Ahhh. A young woman after my own heart.

The only other fascinating observation I have today is that this place is crazed for small and large amusement parks. I can see three Ferris wheels from this building! I’ll go into that more later, but did want to share all the amusements I can see without going outside.

This is the small but shiny amusement park they’ve been working on behind the condo. Looks like they are trying to get it open for Memorial Day. By the way, we better be LONG gone before then; apparently it’s wild then.

I hope your life is good, and that if you need to pivot, you’re able to do so with grace and good humor.

Practically Finishing a Knitted Object!

I’ve been diligently knitting away on the Tangerine Eyelet Wrap that’s half entrelac and half lace. It took longer, because I doubled the lace part. Today I finally bound off!

It wraps; thus it is successful. And wow, I have a lot of freckles when not wearing makeup.

I am glad I’m done, because toward the end there, my recent inability to concentrate really caught up with me and I kept making mistakes in the lace and having to go back down and move a yarn over (that’s what makes holes in lace). I was really frustrated, because it was not a hard lace pattern at all. But, here it is, hot off the needles.

There are strings, and it is lumpy, but you get the idea.

I really love the colors of this yarn. I also enjoyed working with it so much. Anything with silk in it makes me happy, I think. If you want to see the details, I took a closer photo.

Diamond lace at left, entrelac rectangles at right.

The instructions said to block the wrap before adding the crocheted border, so I filled the bathtub with tepid water and dunked it all in there. It didn’t change the water color as much as my CBD bath bomb last night did (ahh), but there was some orange in it. I swished gently, and was reminded of that special smell that silkworm thread makes (the negative side of silk). I squeezed as much water out of it as I could by hand, followed by rolling it up in a towel to remove more moisture.

Then I laid the sad looking mass out on towels, and did my best to arrange it to have smooth edges. It would have been easier if I had blocking pins, but I figure I can re-block it after I add the edging and get back to my terribly disorganized knitting supplies.

I turned the fan in the spare bedroom on high to help the drying process go faster. In the meantime, I evaluated my options, and in a surprise, even to me, I decided to frog (unknit) a cowl I didn’t like the looks of and re-do it into an interesting lace-striped shawl called Lines and Lines that one of my knitting friends shared on Twitter. I got the pattern and am ready to start. Whee. Way to spontane, Suna.

This needed to be made out of laceweight yarn, I think. So, it will now be unraveled.

I can work on this and dishcloths the rest of the trip. Good car knitting, and maybe I can manage to concentrate on it. Darn my brain.

On Another Topic

Lee had promised me a trip to the restaurant we enjoyed so much last year, the Café Old Vienna. We didn’t want to eat in a crowded restaurant, so we went early, only to happily discover they had an outside dining area. Well, I was happy until I remembered that it’s still Bike Week, so we got to enjoy them, fire trucks, ambulances, and the arrival of a giant Cisco truck making as much noise as possible while delivering.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed my happy-hour dark Hefe beer very much, and found the red sauce my cabbage rolls were covered in divine. There were no complaints to be had about the food. Even the salad had extra-good cucumbers (thanks to the Cisco truck, I guess). Lee was feeling out of sorts, but did love the butter sauce on his chicken.

We’re taking it easy today, and hoping the weather isn’t so horrible that we can’t go to the last State Park tomorrow. It’s at least fairly nearby. We’re also keeping an eye on the news, which says the weather is really bad at home (it keeps saying that, but then we get no rain, according to the family).

And here’s a question for the Trickster Gods: why does there have to be some disaster that comes up every time we go to Myrtle Beach that makes us wonder if we’ll make it home? Last year they were shutting the doors to the country as we passed through each state, at the start of the COVID crisis. This year some hackers with nothing better to do messed up a pipeline and now people are panicking over getting gasoline for their cars. I do hope we can go back to Texas at the end of the week!

I mean, really, Trickster Gods, this is nice, but I miss my family, equines, dogs, chickens, and large monitors!

Another Post about Birds, Beaches, and Beauty

Judging from my stats, people are getting tired of my beachy posts about nature in South Carolina. Unfortunately, that’s all I have right now, since the rest of my brain is in total shutdown mode, which has not made me popular with folks who want me to do things. But, I needed a break.

So, today was a real vacation day! Lee and I went on a long boat tour to North Island, an uninhabited place an hour by boat from Georgetown, from where we embarked. It was most definitely NOT a fancy boat, but it did the job.

We were promised lots of bird sightings, and we did get those, though on the way out to North Island, the water was a bit choppy for photography. I did learn my lesson last time, and got a seat near the front of the boat. That meant a bit of splash got on us, but if you’re on a small boat, you need to expect to get wet at some point!

They had a naturalist doing the narration, and she was not as cheesy as the previous tour guide was. She did have a few ghost stories, since she’s written three books on it, but really had a lot of interesting history of the area to share. There’s some old stuff in this area! She also shared a lot of information about rice plantations, so I feel full of the knowledge.

We eventually got to the island and embarked on an excursion on the beach. I found one really nice shell, then got sort of dazed by how many colors of oysters they have on that beach, and I did get a few of those.

A variety of oysters, cockle shells and a whelk or something. I am not a shell person.

I was there more to look at living things, and I was not disappointed at this interesting beach. I’m glad I wore my sandals, because the beach was littered with jellyfish, but also had a lot of fascinating patterns of water, since it was low tide. The most beautiful things I saw were blue crabs, though. We had a lot of fun looking for them among the rocks in the jetty. There was lots of seaweed, barnacles, and other interesting stuff. The weirdest thing, though, was this area of clay, really slippery clay. I am going to have to look up what’s up with that.

I really enjoyed watching the crabs crabbing along and interacting with each other. They are so blue! I also found a number of hermit crabs in moon shells, but I put them back in the water before taking any photos. I sure hope no one picked those up thinking they were empty, because they are in for some bad smells, and bad karma, I guess.

Of course, I wanted to find birds. I don’t think I ever saw so many pelicans in my life, and they were a lot of fun, splashing, diving, swimming, and flying.

There were also many gulls, particularly laughing gulls, who were also swooping, diving, and swimming. They were quite loud. They are entertaining and beautiful birds.

There were also many beautiful shore birds, but we didn’t see egrets and herons on the island (there were plenty on the beaches near the old rice fields, though). I think there were sandpipers and plovers, including another black plover.

There was one more bird we were promised a sighting of, and that was the bald eagle. You can sure tell they are on the comeback trail, because we saw multiple birds (plus a couple of ospreys and one juvenile bald eagle). No, these are not great pictures, but that’s all the ole iPhone X can manage.

Not a bald eagle, but a lot of cormorants and gulls

It was nice to just ride along and look at the scenery, even though it wasn’t a really beautiful day or anything. I haven’t been on boats in the ocean but one other time, when Anita and I took that tour of marshes. I enjoyed the relaxation aspect of being on the water as much as anything else.

Oh wait, I forgot we got to see this lighthouse, which is still doing its duty, and has for hundreds of years. There is a lot of OLD stuff here.

Even the loud motorcycles didn’t ruin my mood. Going to the island was a really different and pleasant activity. I’m going to share a couple of more photos, just because the island was so ruggedly beautiful.

I hope this day brought you some peace and focus.

Birds, Trees, Castles, Oysters, and Adventure

Here’s another blog just chock full of photos, and not all of them are nature. It’s all good though. We just had a long day of visiting a variety of sights and sites.

We set out early (for us), determined to see everything possible at Huntington Beach State Park. It’s across the road from Brookgreen Gardens, and features nature, birds, beaches, and a really interesting house that belonged to the people who used to own both the properties, the Huntingtons. Last year I saw better birds, but we still had a good time today.

We first went out to see the nature, where, of course, I spent a lot of time taking close-up pictures of plants. Lee says this is what I always look like.

I did find some pretty things to take pictures of, though some of them were Lee. There were many native berries, a spider, and the MOST exciting, a painted bunting.

From there, we headed over to Atalaya, the “castle” where the Huntington family lived in the winters. Folks, this is a really, really weird house. It’s all brick, even the floors, and all one story. It’s in the shape of a huge square with a very large courtyard in the middle. Every room, even the bathrooms, has a fireplace. I find that interesting, but it does get cold enough, even in South Carolina, to need some winter warmth.

Who Hates Changing Email Addresses?

Um, that would be everyone, right? I’ve known I’ve needed to do it for quite a while, since we downsized our real estate work and parted (as good friends) from our Hermit Haus Redevelopment partners. Eventually all that internet stuff will get retired, though I need to figure out a way to archive our blog and photos of our work.

I’ve never liked using Gmail but it’s the best option for right now. My presence at Hearts Homes and Hands is very minimal, since I’m not beloved in all parts of our community. I’m no longer too concerned about it. Life at the ranch is good, and that’s what counts! Anyway, I’d only use that email account for business.

Speaking of the ranch, this will grow up to be the arch going over our cattle guard or second gate. It’s happening!

Still, it has boggled my mind when I realize how many logins, sign-ins and account names are tied to your email address! I spent hours this morning changing things, and I’m nowhere near finished. But, it had to be done, and I certainly don’t have many expanses of unbooked time at home!

After I at least got my major accounts and lists switched over, I tediously went through my Gmail account and deleted spam and ads from 2015 until today. 20,000 plus emails. Fun times. I didn’t want to delete them all, since there might be personal email in there. Yep, my sister, my friend Pamela, and two others had been sending me things I never saw.

Actually, that’s what prompted moving at this exact time. My sister, who is the latest person to say they are going to the Farm in Yorktown for a weekend and not returned, texted me to “check email.” Nothing like a cryptic text to get me concerned, you know? But I couldn’t find anything on my work or personal accounts. Was something wrong? Did I mess something else up? Finally I looked at Gmail. Whew. There was a message there. I’d forgotten to send some money in our confusing travel stuff.

All, right, I said, it’s time to start using that account and phasing the other one out. Once I figured out how to delete everything from a particular sender, it was only slightly unbearable. And at least I could look out at the ocean while deleting. It was fun mass deleting email from presidential candidates who won one and l0st another election. Quite a trip through time.

I’d rather have been in the ocean. Yes I went in. No jellyfish got me.

Now I have that account organized and set up to store email right. Still, I have to figure out what stuff I get on Hermithaus I want to keep getting. And I have to figure out why the new signature I made refuses to show up. This is why I didn’t want to embark on this task. Ugh

But, I’m at the beach, in the shade, and drinking a drink out of a bucket. And my ranch family is busy planning a swimming pool.

Everyone is saying my obligations can wait, so today is just Beach Day. Hope you’re doing well and handling what can be a hard weekend for some of us.

Cruising the Waccamaw River

Today has been fun. We’ve driven all over the area and seen many things. As we approached our lunch venue, we got to enjoy watching a drawbridge open, one of the ones that turns sideways rather than going up and down.

Drawbridge open. You can see a sailboat going through, sort of.

The bridge had a cool bridge house on it, too. It was at a crossing on the Waccamaw River, which forms the Intracoastal Waterway here. The road was called Dick Pond Road, which gave us the giggles as we imagined the pond full of male anatomical parts.

We had burgers at a restaurant that specializes in them, River City Cafe, and Lee got a ridiculously large concoction featuring two grilled cheese sandwiches as the buns, two burger patties, mushrooms and other things, cheese, and two extra-large onion rings on top. No, he did not eat it all.

After that, we headed past a cute private zoo with very happy animals and lots of screaming peacocks. We didn’t go in, but looked at lots from the car, including a very young baby donkey colored like Fiona.

Our destination was a cruise down the Waccamaw River, Socastee Creek, and nearby creeks. Its a nice change from condo world.

All these waterways have a canal running through them, built by the Army Corps of Engineers, because the natural waterways are too wiggly for the yachts and sailboats who use the Intracoastal. Here’s a map:

Before the boat ride, I wandered around the grounds of the docks, which are nestled in a beautiful swampy area with many native flowers, trees, and shrubs. I was delighted to see some flowers I’d never seen in the wild before. The partridgeberry flowers were tiny, hairy, and delicate, while the swamp leatherflower was a happy surprise to find hiding in the iris foliage. That’s one of the prettiest flowers I ever saw! The spiderlilies I’ve seen somewhere else before, but their delicacy always takes my breath away.

I enjoyed chatting with the staff, all of whom live on the property, one of them on his boat. I could stand looking at that scenery every day plus having a zoo next door (downwind).

I enjoyed ignoring Rick, the guide’s, dorky stories (I know it’s their job to tell them and entertain people, but I’d heard most of the jokes already) and looking through my binoculars at giant turtles, flowers, cypresses, and tupelo trees. We only saw three watercraft other than ours, so it was satisfyingly secluded. I think it gets more crowded with rowdy boat partiers in the summer, so our timing was good (only saw one boat full of giggling women). The weather went from sunny to cloudy to raining to sunny, so there were always varied skies. Do click on them to see them enlarged. The reflections and clouds are lovely. (Also, when people click on every image my blog stats go wild!)

We saw lots of nesting ospreys, flying swallowtail kites, herons, and egrets, plus one small gator. People liked that. We got to see osprey drama, with one catching a fish and others chasing and yelling at each other. I’ve always enjoyed ospreys since I was a kid and we’d see them nesting in Cedar Key, on the Florida Gulf coast.

A highlight of bird watching was finding a prothonotary warbler flitting around. It also thrilled the nice little girl in front of me. Our guide told me he had some nest in his other boat’s cupholder. Since I was nowhere near close enough to get a photo, here’s one of Rick’s along with one of the babies in his cup holder.

All in all, the trip was worth the cheesiness, though we definitely had the worst seats on the boat (next time, get starboard, Suna!), next to the bathroom. But, we were polite and let everyone else get on first, so whose fault was that? We got the bonus of enjoying Bella, the owners’ large Rottweiler-style dog, who has a huge joy of living. Watching her play brought laughter and joy to us all, as she ran, flopped, threw a toy around, and spontaneously dug.

People who have a dog that nice can’t be all bad, so I’m glad we could contribute to their small business!

A Very Short Whine

I’m really trying to get to all the things I have to do, but I just crashed when I got home today, which may explain why I originally published the blog post full of typos and a missing paragraph. I have things to write, figuring out my social security and retirement plans, change over my email address to a boring personal one, and other riveting activities. But, after the stuff that’s been going on at work and home, I’m running on fumes.

I’m sorry I’m so behind on my volunteer work, but I’m wiped out by worry, disappointments, and frustrations (none of which you will read about in this blog or hear about in the podcast). I just wanted to remind you that not everything in my life shows up here. Which leads me to remind you and me both that we all have our unspoken struggles, so let’s choose kindness and patience, even when it’s a struggle.

We Had to Get Ourselves Back to the Garden

However, we didn’t head to Woodstock; we went back to Brookgreen Garden. We rose with the sun and both worked hard today, so we really needed to take advantage of the multi-day tickets we had.

We headed in a different direction this time, and of course saw lots of flowers. I’m amazed at the variety.

There were, of course, many beautiful statues. My favorite was three women sitting on a framework of metal, just lounging around naked. Such ennui. It’s just what they do!

I also liked the Don Quixote statue, which was in a lovely planting of Texas plants. At least I think that’s what it was. I’ve seen all the plants there at home, anyway.

Eventually, we made our way to the BEST PART of the whole place. It’s a Low Country trail and zoo with native animals and farm animals that would have been on the plantations. My favorites were the river otters. I teared up watching them play.

I enjoyed goats, horses, an interesting cow, owls (lots of cool ones, but hard to photograph), a big ole alligator, and chickens. Bit by far the best exhibit was the aviary. I was in heaven there. So many of my my favorite birds, up close and personal.

The habitat was truly beautiful. You could watch the birds catch and stalk fish, interact, and even build nests! This was so much fun, and interesting. We saw a few other animals, like a little green frog, Canada geese, a pretty skink, and many more brown thrashers.

All that stuff was good, but I’d have honestly been fine just walking around looking at the ancient trees and the rice fields that are going back to nature. I feel so at home among the shadows and moss. I hope you enjoy some of my landscape images.

Anita, Stop Reading Here

And now for my final fun observation. I was really wanting to get some photos of the really interesting squirrels here. There were many fine gray squirrels, and sure, I enjoyed them.

I’d never seen the other kind of squirrel they have here, though. They are big, with long and curly tails, plus black heads with white noses. What cuties! So, I obsessively tried to get a good photo of one. Instead, I got a bunch of okay but blurry pictures.

You could have knocked me over with a feather when I heard these were fox squirrels, the same kind we have in Texas. But these look so cool. Of course, I looked it up on iNaturalist. Sure enough, fox squirrels come in a bunch of different colors. They can also be black.

Hooray for me. I learned a new nature fact AND relaxed. It’s time to actually vacation, I think.

PS: Anita did NOT stop reading when she got to the squirrel part. I did warn her!

Pancakes: The Odd Thing about South Carolina Dining Out

Yeah, many towns look exactly alike, with the same stores, same shopping areas, and same restaurants. But, still, you can find interesting local differences if you pay attention. Here are some random things we’ve been noticing in South Carolina.

A Pancake and Waffle Obsession

Apparently, these are most beloved. Photo by @lorenklein via Twenty20

There are many restaurants around the US that specialize in pancakes and waffles. However, I’m pretty sure this part of South Carolina has the most pancake/waffle eating options of any place, or at least of any place I’ve been. The Waffle House chain has been around a long time (why, since 1955, according to the website), and you see them at many highway exits and such. But, here, in a 30-something mile stretch of one highway, I saw five of them. Then I looked on the Google Maps. Whoa.

You don’t have to go far for a waffle anywhere in this region. And by the way, this is making a person who hasn’t had breakfast really hungry. Too bad I’m tied to my headphones (I started this post while waiting for no one to show up to my early book club AGAIN).

So, waffles are made in a waffle-maker appliance, while pancakes (or flap-jacks or many other names) are cooked on a griddle or large pan. Thus, “pan” cakes. I get it now. The people of northern South Carolina, or perhaps it’s the tourists coming TO northern South Carolina) apparently consume a lot of these.

MMM, absolutely no nutritional value whatsoever, the perfect American food. Photo by @shanti via Twenty20

Usually in the US, you see IHOP, which used to be the International House of Pancakes, but modernized its name, just like KFC is no longer Kentucky Fried Chicken. Fine, try to hide your roots! I can recall my brother really liking chocolate chip pancakes from there, while I always wanted some exotic “international” crepe or something. I actually still like to eat there once in a while, because I like their coffee and breakfasts, which come with a small number of pancakes that won’t kill me.

Here, though, there are so many pancake options you could eat at a different one for a couple of weeks without repeating. People here must really love pancakes, or maybe they just eat breakfast a lot, since they’re all on vacation.

I also notice that other restaurants, like Cracker Barrel, focus on pancakes in their local signs, though I keep missing my photo ops.

Closest pancake to where we are staying.

I’ll probably never figure this one out. But it’s got me looking for pancake and waffle restaurants everywhere! Austin has taco places on every corner. Cameron has Mexican restaurants. What’s overly abundant where you live?