North Carolina: Wilmington and Jordan Lake

After Charleston we decided to take it easy and have a night in Durham and off and another small road trip to Wilmington, NC. It's only a 2 and half hour drive and both Jimmy and I like the beach. North Carolina beaches really are lovely.

Apparently, Wilmington is twinned with Doncaster (or Donkey as I like to call it). From that sign I reckon that Sheffield is about 3900 miles away from Durham.

Last time I was on this they were filming One Tree Hill, no such luck this time.

After our little trip to Wilmington, we stopped by Jordan Lake. Which is rather nice.

We got there at just the right time. Partially due to one of my famous short cuts.....


We finished the day with a burger at Dain's. Although we didn't have any Bojangles Jimmy did have a good tour of NC and SC and it was damn good to see him again. This concludes Jimmy's adventures in NC, more of my other adventures wil be coming soon.

South Carolina: Drinking in Charleston

Charleston is a really cool place to visit for all the touristy things, but also it is a really cool place to go out drinking. Here is the photographic evidence of us getting wasted. After our day of walking we got pretty thirsty so we stopped in a Irish bar for a cheeky pint (or 2). Then got ready to go out and hit a brew pub first. They offered a selection of all their beers for $10. They didn't have the eighth so we got to choose our favourite at the end. I think it worked out as about 3 and a half pints in the end.

I was obviously so excited I couldn't even keep my eyes open. Well it passed the time while we waited for food.

This bar we actually found in the day. It was the place where we found a good cupa... water, juice and nice bit of apple strudel, everything three growing boys needs to get over a hangover. The waitress took a shine to us and said we should come back later when it was a bar. So here we are after a few drinks, the tequila slammers come out.... not so good. The aforementioned waitress was kind enough to document it for us.

We hadn't even got going and Andy had borrowed her top....

Cheers! To England! etc

This really does remind me of the three monkeys.

By the end we had progressed onto surfers on acid and quite happy about it.

We even found an English pub which I was extremely happy about.

Yes Andy did steal the waitresses coat, it was really hot, but it brought out his eyes. She got it back in the end.

South Carolina: Charleston

As I have been terrible with updating the blog the next post is when Jimmy flew down from Canada and we drove down to Charleston, SC to meet Andy in July. Charleston is only 300 miles away from Durham so it was too bad a drive.

It was great the Jimmy decided to fly down to Dirty D. I got to show him a few things round town and we just had a chilled out first evening. Then we drove down to Charleston the next day. We took a minor detour, as I kinda got carried away during an in-car game and missed the [not so] small sign[s, lots of them] for I-95. It was pretty cool seeing rural NC. Jimmy had definitely not seen anything like it in his life (I'm sure we heard a few banjos). We met up with Andy a little late, but that was due to setting off late (due to my bosses, grrrrr).

I will go through our nighttime adventures in the next post, here is my photoblog of Charleston in the day. Blue was the order of the day, I'm sure people were staring at us! It's quite funny how white Jimmy looks (and ahem how American Andy and I look).

The next few photos are just things I liked and snapped them while we were wandering about.

The waterfront.

A wee turtle in the SC aquarium. It was really cool place to go and I learnt a few things about the coast of NC and SC, mainly that it has a lot of cool things in the sea.

We had a great day in Charleston, and I really do recommend it to anyone. It has a bit of everything, the old, the new, places to eat, the beach and a good night life (see next post). It is a great place to get away from it all too.

Georgia: Savannah

After over a year in the states I finally broke down and got a car. I really wish I could have afforded one earlier it has given me so much freedom. Anyway for my first big trip on my own I met up with Andy in Savannah. Savannah, GA is about 350 miles from Durham, about a 6 hour drive and about the same for Andy from Tallahassee, FL, so it was fate.

Driving 6 hours is weird on your own is strange at first. I stopped a lot, even if it was just to get out of the car to strech my legs. I was surprised that I didn't feel too tired during it. I guess cold air-con, caffeine, loud music, and bad singing is enough to keep anyone awake. Also I was really excited to see Andy, I could talk British!!!

Here are some snaps from Savannah.

It has a great 'old town', with lots of squares.


It was bloody hot but lots of nice shade.


It was nice to see 'old things' in Savannah. Instead of that nasty 10 year old strip mall.


It was great just wandering around putting the world to right soaking up the atmosphere.


It felt like the proper 'south' down here


I just loved this graffiti on the building site for a new group of shops


I just liked this shot.

Meeting Andy was well worth the drive. It is really strange meeting an old friend in a completely different part of the world. It was great catching up, talking crap about how the US and the UK are different etc. It almost felt like we had not left Sheffield, but then again it felt like so long ago, so many things had changed. Thankfully somethings hadn't. We still got tea, drank beer in the day and forced the Americans to watch the EURO cup while we had lunch. Although drinking cocktails in a gazebo by a pool in shorts before dinner is a new one for us. we actually went to a 'British pub' called Churchill's for dinner. It tasted like home, a twinge of homesickness, but in a good way. Then a traditional British night of carnage ensued. A not so traditional pancake breakfast and off back to Durham in the morning. The weekend was so much fun and I really can't do it justice on the blog, but I do recommend Savannah. It's such a pretty place, great food and great bars, still working on the Tea tho.

Duke marine lab, Beaufort, NC

Ok I know it's been a while, but I am back. Firstly I am really sorry, I don't have an excuse. I am just lazy. The good news is, I did take a lot of photos. So enjoy all the updates I will try and roll of ASAP.

A few months ago we had a departmental retreat (in the form of a mini conference) to the Duke marine lab in Beaufort, NC. It was cool to get out of the lab and out of Durham and see some more coastal NC. It hit me how rich Duke actually is on this trip. We passed the UNC marine lab on the way, a 'warehouse' in moorehead city. Duke owns an island!

Here are some of my Lab group, front row left to right, Debby, Yee and Tao and Jeff and I on the back. As you can see we were doing a lot of work...

Here is the actual island and the view of Beaufort. The island to the left has wild horses on it. Behind that are the outer banks and the Atlantic. Tough life, aye?

Here is some of my department. Being the geeky engineers that we are we sat inside all day.

This is my boss playing a crazy game of pool. He was the only Professor that chatted to people other than professors and had a laugh with us. We had just finished working on my presentation that I had to give in the morning. My first real presentation. It went pretty good actually.

Here is a subtle picture of fat people on the beach.


We also visited a civil war fort, it was great. I just loved this sign.

It was a pretty cool design. Not your big ol' castle type thing.

A great view of the Atlantic too

I don't know quite why they had a cannon pointed at the wall, well it was a civil war after all...

Tough times back then

Ah NC beaches. We did work I promise.

Boone, NC

A few weeks ago a went on a 'bachelor party' or as we would call it a stag do. It was for a grad student who I work with, Andres. We went to Boone, NC. it wasn't a crazy Vegas affair, just beers and good food in the mountains. Here is Andres.

Here is Teja, who is a candidate for one of the craziest people I know. I know Rhodri! I look absolutely cream crackered as I have just driven 200 miles.

When they said in the brochure you need a 4 x 4 to get up the driveway, we were thought it would be fine. Thankfully we could walk it.

It was a little redneck but still bloody nice.


"we have to walk up that?"

The smoky mountains, part of the blue ridge mountains of the Appalachians mountains that run along the east coast.

They are also near the Great Smoky Mountains and have the characteristic haze.

I didn't take this photo as it was up a tower that was far to shaky for me to get up :(

The scenary was just fantastic

Here is a picture of the 'dudes' left to right: Teja, Randy, Andres, Hui and me looking cool (ahem)

Obviously I can't post pictures of the drinking so here are some trees.

Some scary looking ones

We also went fishing. Surprisingly caught some fish (OK it was in a fish farm), one of those bad boys is mine.

They tasted bloody good. Lemon, herbs, butter and a grill.