Ninety Six

Where to go? Where to Go? Ah – South Carolina – just a five minute drive away. Sounds good.

We head for a tiny little town called Ninety Six. Supposedly the town was called this because it is 96 miles from Charleston and also 96 miles from a major Cherokee village. It is also where the Ninety Six National Battlefield is. Great – another battlefield. Not my favorite place to visit but if one is a completist and needs to see all the National sites, one has no choice but to visit another (*^&%^% battlefield.

Ninety Six is one of the lesser National Sites in terms of visitation. Only about 65,000 people visit each year. It is a little bit out of the way, which might explain it. Also, it is a battlefield which in itself explains the lack of interest. Sorry, my prejudices are showing through.

Ok, I can admit when I'm wrong. This was really interesting. Revolutionary War – British have built a star shaped fort. Nathaniel Greene comes along and commences the longest siege of the Revolutionary War. It lasts for about a month. General Greene is not just sitting around though, waiting for the British to give up. Nope – he is busy having his men digging trenches. He starts out about 70 feet from the fort but that is too close so he backs up a bit. The first trench is parallel to the fort so I guess that is why they called them Parallels. Then they dig some zig-zag trenches called Saps to connect to the second closer Parallel. Sort of like little ants, building their tunnels creeping ever closer to the fort. One dark night, the Patriots built a thirty fort tall tower so they could shoot down into the Star Fort. So the British added more sandbags on the top of their fort walls. The Patriots tried to dig a tunnel to go under the fort walls but that proved unsuccessful. It goes on and on. It was like slow motion warfare. Eventually the Patriots gave up and left, then the British also left burning the fort and the town. It was a pleasant day and we could take Miko on the battlefield grounds which is always nice.

 

Replica of the 30 foot tower that the Patriots built

 

More flowers

 

We stayed in Lake Greenwood State Park. We had a couple of wonderful sites overlooking the pines and the lake. Weather is beautiful. What was the problem with this place? Evidently South Carolina has it's Spring Break the week after Easter and Lake Greenwood was packed. The really unique feature of this park is that they allow golf carts. Every single camper seems to have a golf cart. Back in the late sixties, the big thing for teenagers to do in Minneapolis was to cruise Lake Street – up and down the street – checking out all the other teens cruising. Carloads of girls. Carloads of boys. Well, here at Lake Greenwood cruising is done by golf carts. Golf carts loaded with girls. Golf carts loaded with boys. There were golf cart traffic jams. It would be pretty funny if I weren't such a curmudgeon. At least golf carts are electric and quiet so that was a positive.

 

Local Dog Park - Miko loved hanging out up top