If you’ve never been gobsmacked when you walked into a restaurant, then you’ve never been to Johnson Creek Tavern.

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After our horse drawn carriage tour of Beaufort…(did you say Byoo-fert like I taught you?)

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We strolled along the harbor for a spell.

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Then headed over the bridge to explore the Sea Islands.

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Since the husband was hungry we stopped for a late lunch. Not much was open this time of year but we found a spot on the marsh called Johnson Creek Tavern.

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It was an unassuming little place, and while I don’t know exactly what I was expecting…

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It definitely wasn’t this.

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Every square inch of the place was covered in money.

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Yes, as in real U.S. currency. Ones, fives and tens. Most had names or funny sayings written on the face.

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One bad margarita….

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Some run of the mill hushpuppies with, oh the horror, margarine …

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And a terrible bowl of gumbo later, we decided we wouldn’t be eating lunch here… but we did marvel at the decor and inquire about its origins.

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It started at the bar decades ago as these things do. The first dollar spent, a big tip, a foreign bill brought back from faraway lands. But then it grew…

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And grew and grew.

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Now… they harvest the bounty every so often and donate it all to charity. Last year a veterans group was the happy recipient of over $11,000.

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And that’s money well spent.

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The flamingo agrees.

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32 thoughts on “If you’ve never been gobsmacked when you walked into a restaurant, then you’ve never been to Johnson Creek Tavern.”

      1. I’ve rarely heard that 4 letter string said other than bow- certainly not byoo-, but I recall a lady many years ago, Mrs Beauchamp, referred to herself as Beecham. I would’ve pronounced bowshom in an attempt of mimicking the French. I once worked with a lady named Haworth, but referred to her as hay-worth, because the phonetic whore-worth bothered me! Not sure if it bothered her…

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      2. I actually thought it might be something like that. But I thought it was early Aussie racism, thinking maybe it was more English sounding than French so they wouldn’t be called ”wog’, which was thrown about back in the day. So sort of close! Thanks for the history lesson!

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      3. “Beau” alone is definitely BO. With “fort” I can’t imagine it as anything but BYOOfert. And I agree, with Beauchamp, I’ve never heard it any other way than BEEcham. It’s kinda of like the string “ough,” it has a quite versatile phonetic range!

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  1. Okay so I don’t believe there is such a thing as a bad margarita. So care to explain what the “bad” part of it was? And margarine should be banned, if it’s not real butter then it shouldn’t be served. That chowder didn’t look appetizing what so ever. Glad they do something good by donating all of that cash, since they don’t use it to train their cooks, lol.

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  2. Too bad about the food, but what a great idea!
    Margaret Beaufort (BO-fert) was Henry VIII’s grandmother, and I’ve done so much reading on that dynasty that I just can’t pronounce the name any other way, I’m afraid. Similar problem with Buena Vista, Colorado. Locals call it “byoonee,” but 9 nears of Spanish lessons tells me otherwise and I refuse to say it like the locals do.

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  3. The most surprising thing of all? That’s just one year’s worth of money pictured!

    Also, that has to be the most uninspiring and lame margarita I have ever seen. Shame on them for even serving such a monstrosity.

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