This new national part, formerly a national monument, is very interesting.  It is actually made up of several different sites, including a couple of St Helena Island that are tied to the beginning of the Penn Center, and the camp at the Naval Hospital.  Tours are offered to those sites on different days, and the visitors center is always open.  It is in a great restored old building in downtown Beaufort, and even though it is small, it has some really interesting exhibits about reconstruction:  economics of the time, education, politics.  Very well done, of course.

This weekend Lindee, Addie, & I went on our annual birthday trip to Beaufort, SC.  What a great time we had, and what a wonderful place to visit.  Our first stop was before we actually got into Beaufort, where we stopped to explore the Sheldon Church Ruins, a church that was built before the Revolutionary War, and burned not long afterwards.  Very interesting and so beautiful.