Splurge on your cultural adventure for a South Carolina Road Trip. National Geographic recommends “Day 3: Load up your canoe. It's 12 miles (19 kilometers) down the black-water Edisto River to your own riverbank tree house in a private 140-acre (57-hectare) refuge.”

Enjoy a steal on your low key, low cost Orangeburg budget travel and lodging at Southern Lodge. Besides outdoor and wildlife adventures, the area is known for its agricultural and cotton plantations, Orangeburg County is comprised of quaint townships and historic hamlets. [The Towns of Rivers, Rails, and Crossroads Region have an asterisk *.]

Orangeburg * -Less


Orangeburg *
Orangeburg, the Garden City, features the Edisto Memorial Gardens. These gardens commemorate the site of where 600 Confederate soldiers temporarily held off the Union Army in 1865. Rank the gardens among the top twenty tourist attractions in South Carolina, with 600,000 visitors annually, are 150 acres of cypress trees, azaleas, camellias, and 5,000 rose plants. Included is Horne Wetlands Park, a 2,600-foot boardwalk along the North Edisto River. Garden events include the South Carolina Festival of Roses in April and the Children's Garden Christmas.

Orangeburg also features the historic campuses of South Carolina State University and Claflin College, vital to African American heritage, Orangeburg County's Fine Arts Center, the Bluebird Theater, and Robert Stevenson Auditorium, plus many antique shops, historic homes, churches, and cemeteries.



Bowman (once alleged to have been known as Oak Ridge)
Branchville
Cope
Cordova
Elloree * -Less


Elloree
Elloree is a small, charming town on the move. The Old Towne District, founded a century ago in 1886, will be open by the fall of 1999, with dinner theaters featuring live entertainment, shops, and a museum. The end of March brings the Elloree Trials horse races at the Elloree Training Center. Look for the Elloree Farmers' Market in Joe Miller Park in the summer and guided tours of the Elloree cotton gin and fields in the autumn. Other festivals and activities happen during the year. Cove visit us -- seven miles from Santee on S.C. Highway 6.



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Eutawville
Eutawville is located three miles from the Eutaw Springs Battlefield, one of the last major battles (1781) fought in South Carolina during the American Revolution. The town grew up in the 1830s around the historic Church of the Epiphany, and was chartered in 1888 near the Ferguson-Elloree fork of the Eutawville Railroad. Indian Bluff Park provides free boating, swimming, and picnicking facilities, with a fishing pier and nature trail. South Carolina game management department offers deer, dove, and quail hunting. Accommodations are available within the area.



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Holly Hill
Experience the amenities of rural life in Holly Hill, population 1478. Located in exciting Santee-Cooper Country, Holly Hill is easily accessible from Interstates 26 and 95 and from US Highway 78, the Heritage Discovery Route. Forty-six miles northwest of historic Charleston, Holly Hill is the southwestern anchor of the Eastern Orangeburg County Discovery Trail, which showcases life in the adjacent small towns. Chartered in 1887, Holly Hill's turn-of-the-century homes and stores, restored railroad depot, and old churches and cemeteries record the past. Within the area are motels and campsites, local culinary delights, family recreation, seasonal tours, and festivals. Anchored in its proud past, Holly Hill is a slice of Americana.



Livingston
Neeses
North
Norway
Rowesville
Santee * -Less


Santee
As the traditional halfway stop between New York and Miami, Santee offers more than just accommodations to the traveling public. At exit 98 on Interstate 95, Santee is the gateway to Santee-Cooper Country, where Lakes Marion and Moultrie provide a paradise for vacationers. Santee offers access to the best fishing in the Southeast, as well as golfing, swimming, camping, and shopping for all ages. The area features restored Victorian towns, cotton fields, historic African American churches and cemeteries, and lake tours, where you can see and experience local wildlife and some of the oldest stands of cypress trees. Santee looks to the future, while honoring its past.



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Springfield
Once the steam locomotive brought people and business to the town of Springfield, chartered in 1887 and located in the western corner of Springfield County. Now Highways 3 and 4 connect this small town near the South Fork of the Edisto River to Columbia, Orangeburg, Aiken, and Augusta.

Residents share with visitors their historic downtown district and residential architecture; good barbeque and country cooking; flea market and livestock market; shops, art and pottery gallery; and churches, cemeteries, and battlefields. Springfield's rivers and streams, swamps, woods, and fields offer fishing, boating, and hunting.

The town hosts the Governor's Frog Jump and International Egg Striking Contest every year the Saturday before Easter, a fourth of July Trailwalk and Fireworks Show, an October Trailgate Picnic, and in December both the Mayor's Christmas Tree Lighting and the Springfield Defends Fruitcake Event.



Vance
Woodford
Other census-designated places (CDP) include Brookdale and Wilkinson Heights.

There’s water, water everywhere in Orangeburg County.
“Since Colonial times, the Edisto redbreast has had the reputation of being the best in the world, and fishermen have tried many ways to catch this beautiful fish.” (Source: Santee Recreation) With a slogan “Working Hard, Living Easy,” Orangeburg County is a haven for water sport aficionados. Find time to float down a river bordered by wildflowers and trees dripping with Spanish moss, or toss a lure into one of the Lake Marion, Lake Moultrie or Edisto River to try to nab that once-in-a-lifetime catch of largemouth bass, striped bass, white bass, catfish, crapple, redfish, and bream/bluegill.

Choose an affordable vacation in
South Carolina, the Comfortable State.

Arts and entertainment are important to the citizens of Orangeburg. The Orangeburg League of the Arts is active in staging shows and workshops that foster the visual and lively arts. The Arts Council of Orangeburg County works with the Orangeburg County Fine Arts Center on various cultural projects. – Source: Orangeburg Chamber of Commerce.

Orangeburg South Carolina … Historically Speaking -Less