On the road, and off the diet

© 2012 Lydia Hinshaw 

Lunch in Walterboro

 WALTERBORO, SC --  Friday we began a month-long junket that will end in West Glacier, MT, where we have summer jobs starting in mid-June.
 We had been home seven months this time, and had become unusually bored with the place.  Also, we had jut made the heart-wrenching decision to have one of our cats put to sleep after watching her struggle with declining health for 14 months.
 So it was a relief to be heading up the I-95 ramp, finally and leaving worries behind.
 Our first leg was the familiar nine-hour junket to the North Carolina Sandhills, to spend a few days visiting my relatives and checking out the renovations my first cousin and oldest friend is doing on our late grandmother's house.  The free lodgings there are a draw too.
 But to get there we had to put in a long day on the river-of-steel.
 Over the years I've eaten quick meals or bought gas at just about every I-95 exit in Georgia and South Carolina.  Last October, on our way home from our last trip to Montana, Prince Charming and I were wandering around Walterboro, SC, looking for a cheap motel or campground.
 We found something better -- a sign advertising Duke's Barbecue.  It was a memorable last-night-on-the-road meal, an all-you-can-eat buffet featuring port barbecue, assorted southern style veggies (fried okra!) several dessert choices, and iced tea, all for $10.
 As we approached Walterboro again Friday, the clock was approaching 2 p.m. and we couldn't resist a stop.  Duke's doesn't advertise on I-95 (at least I've never seen a billboard) and is several miles east of the river-of-steel on SC 64.  We found it by accident the first time, but it's now on my internal GPS.
 The meal was memorable once again.  And I look forward to my next visit, because by then I will be old enough to qualify for the senior discount.