I’m starting this roadtrip summary on day 4, as I have yet to retrieve the photos for Days 1 through 3 from Justin’s laptop. Rather then wait on that, I will just start from the back ala the Washington Trip reports, and focus on the drive from South Carolina back to Florida. The trip overall involved traveling north to visit my brother in South Carolina, and spending daytrips to see Myrtle Beach, Wilmington, North Carolina, and Charleston.

Day 4 starts on the road at around 11 am and proceeds west from Summerville, SC to Interstate 95 on  U.S. 17 Alternate. A little bit about U.S. 17A first: U.S. 17 veers northeast from the Interstate 95 corridor at Yemassee, South Carolina for Charleston and the coast. U.S. 17A provides an overall inland bypass route for the U.S. 17 routing between Yemassee and Georgetown. While Interstate 95 and other freeways have dwarfed the U.S. highway system in importance overall, U.S. 17 and the Atlantic Coast from Savannah northward generally is not served by an Interstate highway. So Interstate 95′s path provides a long-distance bypass of the coast, but does not serve the regional needs such as movements between Savannah and Myrtle Beach. That is where U.S. 17 Alternate comes into play. However the path is two-lanes for the most part, and between Summerville and Moncks Corner, congestion and heavy development rules the road. Traffic counts are relatively low in the rural areas though.

U.S. 15 ends at junction U.S. 17 Alternate within the town of Walterboro, South Carolina. The U.S. highway travels northward from here all the way to Painted Post, New York, and originally continued from there to downtown Rochester, New York.

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