Charleston Beaches!

If you are taking time off to visit a coastal town, I have to assume that you will want to spend some time at the beach. In the Charleston area, so long as you have a car, you will be free to explore nearly any type of beach you want. The problem comes from deciding which one you want to visit first. :)

Photo credit: Frank Kehren via Visual Hunt / CC BY-NC-ND

Isle of Palms is probably the beach you've heard the most about. If you live anywhere near Charleston, you will frequently see bumper stickers on the back of people's cars with the letters IOP. You can rightfully assume that the letters probably stand for "Isle of Palms". :)

Isle of Palms is, for the most part, a pretty calm beach. Located within thirty minutes or 15 miles of Charleston, be sure to arrive early or come much later in the day. Isle of Palms Connector Bridge, which connects Sullivan's Island (and the Charleston area) to the Isle of Palms often gets backed up due to tourists hoping to enjoy a day at the beach shortly after 10AM on pretty summer weekends. The beaches in this area are extremely tourist heavy with hotels, rental houses, and condos all along the shore. The calm waters of the surf attract families to the area making it a lovely beach to spend an afternoon. Just don't forget your sunscreen!

And if you forgot sunscreen (or your swimsuit!), there are plenty of touristy shops all along the street next to the beach. There you'll find Coconut Joe's (for fried snacks, seafood, frozen drinks, and key lime pie), Ben & Jerry's, Isle of Palms Beach and Chair Co., and Island Time Beach Shop, among others; plenty of options for fast, cheap, easy food, souvenirs, swimsuits, sunscreen, beach towels, beach chairs, and anything else beachy that you may have forgotten or need!

Photo credit: Darren Copley via VisualHunt / CC BY-NC

Moving on to Folly Beach, you'll discover ocean waves that are more rough and high than what you will discover on many of the other Charleston beaches making this a popular beach for surfers, one of the only surfing beaches on the east coast.

If you follow Folly Island all the way to the south, you will find a small, somewhat remote, park. This is a great place to walk along the surf without having to deal with tourists, and, if you time it right, you can even see the sunset over the water! It is beautiful and definitely worth going out of your way for a good view. :)

For a good sunrise view, drive to the other side of Folly Beach and check out the Morris Island Lighthouse. You can't actually get to the lighthouse from Folly Beach nor is it open to the public, but the view of the lighthouse from the beach can make for a beautiful sunrise shot. Be aware that there is limited parking and a short walk to the beach from the road. Don't park where you aren't suppose to, because you will get ticketed.

Parking on Folly island can be a bit confusing. For free parking, you can park anywhere that there is not yellow along the side of the road or a "no parking" sign, also avoiding driveways and fire hydrants. If you don't want to risk getting a ticket, there are various paid parking spots in small parking lots alongside the road (mainly E. Ashley Ave.). Be sure to put your money in the slot associated with the spot you parked in.

Like Isle of Palms, Folly Beach offers a variety of shops and restaurants in the center of town. Unlike Isle of Palms however, the restaurants and shops are located on the main road leading to the beach rather (Center Ave.) rather than on the road that is parallel to the beach (Arctic Ave.). So as you shop and eat, you will find yourself walking further from the beach rather than along it. Very few restaurants and bars can be found on the water, but if a beachside bar is what you are after, be sure to check out Tides (Blu Restaurant) which offers complimentary parking for restaurant and hotel guests.

Photo credit: EFilc via Visualhunt / CC BY-NC

Not for the faint of heart, Kiawah Beach is located an hour outside of the city, but provides yet another somewhat remote location for beach goers. If you aren't staying at a nearby hotel or rental property, you will need to pay a fee to access the beach through Beachwalker Park. Walk South to discover a mostly empty beach that ends at Kiawah River. Be careful of the tides though, because you could easily get stuck and have to swim back!

If you venture off to Kiawah Island, known for hosting the PGA Championships, make sure to eat beforehand or to take a picnic. Restaurants and shops are hard to find on the island. Plus, after paying a parking fee, you will want to stay on the beach as long as possible.

Photo credit: alnicol2000 via Visualhunt / CC BY-NC

Botany Bay Plantation at Edisto Island and Hunting Island State Park are also just over an hour and a half away and provide a completely different experience from any of the others.

Botany Bay Plantation is a nationally protected park that you pay to enter. Once inside, you will find beautiful oak trees and moss that hang over the roads and give the area an other-worldly feel. Be aware before entering the plantation that there are no restaurants or shops inside the park and that there are also no bathrooms located near the half mile walk to the beach. You will need to make sure to have all of these needs taken care of before arriving.

Once you walk the half mile to the beach, you will find an individual stationed on the beach to make sure you know and follow the rules which include not taking shells from the beach. All shells must remain on the Botany Bay Plantation. Because of that, people use the shells to decorate trees and downed branches all along the beach making for interesting and fun-looking installation art pieces. Take all of the pictures that you want, just don't take the shells! :)

Speaking of downed trees, the beach at Botany Bay Plantation is home to many beautiful trees that are slowly being killed by the ocean's salt water. This can make for a wonderful location to take pictures!

Hunting Beach is very similar to Botany Bay Plantation in that you have to enter a park and pay for parking to get to the beach. However, the main difference, aside from this not being a plantation with historic homes on it, is that there are restrooms, shops, and minimal snacks you can purchase. For $2 cash, you can climb the 187 steps to the top of the Hunting Lighthouse and get a gorgeous view of the coastline, reading about the history of the lighthouse as you go. Don't be too worried about the large number of steps; there are plenty of places to stop as you go. :) However, if heights scare you, you may want to think twice before climbing.

The coastline is gorgeous with lots of trees providing shade on the beach. There are park paths you can take in the woods that run parallel to the beach if beachside walking isn't your thing. Truly, Hunting Beach is beautiful and worth a visit if you can afford the time to do so. Consider making a stop through Beaufort (pronounced BU-fert) if you venture down to Hunting Beach; it's a city much closer to Hunting Beach than Charleston, and worth a stop, in my opinion. :)

So, as you can see, you have plenty of beach options in the Charleston area. It really comes down to deciding what you are looking for in a beach. Do you want something more remote and natural-looking (Hunting, Botany Bay Plantation), something for surfers (Folly) or a family beach (IOP)? What will make your beach experience the best that it can be?

** Linking up to City Trippers: Mummytravels.com or Wandermum.co.uk

***Linking up with Lauren on Location, Marcella from What a Wonderful World, and The Sunny Side of This