Pastel houses and Lowcountry cooking
Charleston is one of the best-preserved historic cities in the American South. Rainbow Row's pastel houses face the harbour, the Battery's mansions look out towards Fort Sumter, where the Civil War's first shots were fired, and church steeples rise over the old town. Nearby plantations such as McLeod and Middleton Place tell the history of the enslaved people who worked them. The food is a highlight: shrimp and grits, she-crab soup and Lowcountry boils, and beaches on Sullivan's Island are only a short drive away.