Experience the best of Isle of Palms

The island is a low strip of sand, dunes and maritime forest on the Atlantic coast, joined to the mainland by a bridge across the Intracoastal Waterway. Its beach faces east for several kilometres, wide at low tide and gentle in the surf, with a county park behind the dunes and a marina on the waterway side.

Sullivan's Island, next along to the south-west, holds Fort Moultrie, where walls of palmetto log soaked up British cannon fire in 1776. Dewees Island lies just to the north-east across an inlet, with Capers Island beyond. Tidal creeks and salt marsh around the island shelter dolphins, pelicans and wading birds, and loggerhead turtles nest on the beach in summer.

Low Country cooking comes with the coast: shrimp and grits, she-crab soup, fried oysters and boiled peanuts, with oyster roasts through the cooler months. Bathing weather lasts from late spring to early autumn, and the island is quiet and mild in winter, with Charleston's old streets a short drive away.