Riverbanks Zoo - Columbia, SC

02-26-07

On Saturday, I headed to the Riverbanks Zoo! It was perfect weather and the zoo itself turned out to be much more than I expected. I apologize for the length of this post, but I was amazed by what the zoo offered and the amazing history that this zoo has and I wanted to share it with you. Half of the zoo is dedicated to animals and the other half is a botanical garden (with an outdoor amphitheater). I spent the first part of my day visiting all the animals, reptiles, fish, birds, etc. It was great!! Unfortunately my digi-cam died and the disposable camera I attempted to use was a bad idea. Oh well... After making my way around all the animal exhibits I then came to a bridge which crosses over the Saluda River. It's known as the Saluda River Bridge (how original, HAHA) and it's what connects the zoo and the botanical gardens. As I made my way across the bridge, I learned that in February 1865, Confederate troops burned down the old State Road Bridge, (a covered bridge crossing the Saluda River way way before the current bridge was ever built), in an attempt to keep General William T. Sherman's army from entering the city of Columbia. Sherman countered the effort and immediately orderded the construction of a temporary bridge. You can see the original large granite rocks/stones that were part of Sherman's bridge along the river bank, as well as the supporting pier foundations at the base of two small river islands. It's really cool! Once I got to the other side of the bridge I had the choice of walking up the paved road to the botanical gardens or seeing where the trailhead went that I noticed out of the corner of my eye. Being the adventurous & curious hiker that I am, I of course took the trailhead. This turned out to be a beautiful hike that leads you to the top where the botanical gardens are. It's a paved greenway-like trail that runs you along the river for a bit and where you will come to the Saluda Factory Ruins. This is one of South Carolina's oldest textile mills. The factory was constructed out of granite blocks around 1830. It became one of the largest cotton mills in the South. Unfortunately, the Union troops set it ablaze during Sherman's occupation of Columbia. On the eve of the burning of Columbia, Sherman and his troops set up camp just above the factory. They began their assault on the city from this ridge on February 17, 1865. A huge boulder, known as "Sherman's Rock," still remains and you can see it from the trail as you hike along. Following the Civil War, the mill was reconstructed on the original granite foundation. It was a wood-frame structure that accidentally caught fire on August 2, 1884. It destroyed the mill for a second and final time. You can see remnants of the granite foundations of the mill. You can also see a keystone arch immediately adjacent to the path. (This was REALLY neat!)When you look closely you can even see drill marks on many of the boulders along the trail. These marks are from a drilling process that split apart the huge rocks in order to produce the blocks of granite used in building the original mill back in the day. Once making it to the top of the hill the trail landed me right into the botanical gardens. Being that the season is winter, the gardens weren't exactly in full bloom. I will have to go back to experience that later. I can only imagine that it's spectacular. From the plants and flowers that I did see it was still a very pretty garden and a nice place to relax after the hike up the steep hill.I made my way back down the trail and back to the other side of the bridge where I stopped in for the 3-D African Safari movie before heading home. This turned out to be worth the $3 I spent to get in. It was a 20 minute movie that featured elephants during the first half which I absolutely loved. I recently just watch a National Geographic special on elephants and learned that an elephant stays in the womb approx 22-24 months before being born. In the movie at the zoo, I further learned that elephants flap their ears as a way to fan themselves to cool off and that they actually walk on their toes not the entire big ol' foot that I thought is what they walked on. The 2nd half of the movie featured the white rhino along with deer, giraffe's and buffaloe. I learned how hateful buffaloes are and how other animals fear them b/c of this. I also learned about the rhinos horns and that you can tell how old a rhino is by how long their horn is. It was very interesting. I was very impressed with the Riverbanks Zoo and highly recommend that you check it out if you're ever in the area. I plan to go back as soon as winter clears outta here! It was a wonderful day. Who knew the zoo could be so therapeutic???