‘It’s been a long 6 weeks:’ Some Beaufort Co. restaurants reopened patios Monday
On Beaufort’s waterfront, an employee at Hemingway’s Bistro plopped down a sandwich board sign with the day’s specials as Sublime’s “What I Got” wafted softly from the patio speakers into Henry C. Chambers Waterfront Park on Monday.
A metal patio chair scraped the pavement as Ellen O’Reilly claimed her seat on the patio. The downtown resident didn’t have to place her order and greeted employees by name.
“My weekly meatloaf,” O’Reilly said. “Life is good.”
Whether after hurricanes and other recent storms and now a pandemic, the out-of-the-way lunch spot and bar is O’Reilly’s first stop on the return to normalcy. Restaurants throughout Beaufort County were allowed by S.C. Gov. Henry McMaster to reopen for outdoor dining only on Monday.
Many took advantage of the beautiful weather to do just that.
“It’s been a long six weeks, let me tell you,” said Paul Thompson, owner of Hemingway’s and neighboring Panini’s on the waterfront in Beaufort.
Busy lunch on Hilton Head Island
On Hilton Head Island, restaurants with sprawling outdoor spaces were in good shape to reopen Monday.
Customers responded well, and both Hudson’s Seafood on the Docks and Skull Creek Dockside were full of diners sitting eight feet apart and enjoying views of the water at lunch time.
“We’re happy to be back and open,” Dockside general manager Meggie Thompson said.
Thompson said Dockside kept its nearly 20 tables that are typically situated outside, and staff “got creative” to spread them apart.
Similarly, Hudson’s utilized the large outdoor waiting area — typically full of seat-yourself picnic tables with a pristine view of the sunset — to take its indoor dining room outside.
Andrew Carmines, owner of Hudson’s, said his restaurant had served about 150 customers at lunch time on Monday. The restaurant was using normal serviceware as opposed to disposable, and servers were traveling between tables.
While the Monday lunch shift is not traditionally a coveted shift for servers, Carmines and Thompson said they both had a great turnout for the first day open.
At Hudson’s, staff were required to wear masks, and tables were sanitized between each use.
Mid-island, World of Beer and Poseidon reported a more typical lunch crowd. Both restaurants reconfigured their outdoor spaces to accommodate guests with tables eight feet apart.
At World of Beer, product manager Keith McCool said he’s expecting a big crowd for the restaurant’s burger deal.
“Normally we’re wall-to-wall packed by 5 p.m.,” he said. “We’re expecting it to get crazy though, because people have been calling and asking about it all day.”
‘People are so eager’ in Bluffton
Before the sun beat down on Bluffton, Doug Runyan, wearing black gloves, used an 8-foot-long two-by-four to space out tables outside of Frankie Bones in Buckwalter Place, preparing for the first day of outdoor dining in more than a month.
Couples and families sat outside, and hostesses walked people to their tables.
By 1:30 p.m. Monday, the restaurant had served a total of 53 people, Runyan, the managing partner, said.
Frankie Bones had been open for only about a month before it was forced to close and adapt due to the coronavirus pandemic, Runyan said. Workers offered deliveries and curbside pickup through April.
Even with Monday’s outdoor dining, however, “the volume still isn’t there,” Runyan said.
“This is probably about a quarter of what we would normally do,” he said.
In Old Town Bluffton, restaurant managers said seeing customers sitting down for meals was a welcome start to what likely will be a long journey back to normal, but outdoor space for tables was proving to be an issue.
David Palaces, operations manager of The Cottage, said he anticipated a slow start.
Only one of the seven available tables in the courtyard was occupied just after noon. Palaces said he expects a higher demand through the week leading to Mother’s Day, typically one of their busiest of the year.
“We still want to encourage takeout,” he said. “We’ll be able to do the food, but we just won’t be able to seat all the people that want to sit down.”
Similar space issues were limiting dine-in business at Captain Woody’s in the Promenade.
Manager Laura Jordan said the restaurant could fit only four tables on its porch with the social distancing requirements in place. She said an additional four to six tables likely would be available on the rooftop deck starting Tuesday.
Still, seeing any customers in the restaurant was a plus, she said.
“It’s nice to be feeling a little bit normal,” she said.
One restaurant many people associate with outdoor dining is Old Town Dispensary. Owner and chef Matt Jording said it will be at least a few weeks before his restaurant will be able to open because of ongoing renovations inside and out.
Just a few blocks away, Josh Cook, owner of Corner Perk, has tables lined up on the sidewalk outside his coffee shop, and he pointed out available places to sit nearby.
“We’re just trying to spread everything around,” he said. “What I’m hoping is we can be safe and still be open. Having coffee and brunch is such a comfortable ... kind of feeling.”
Corner Perk has been serving from an outdoor kiosk while the interior of the building gets a facelift, and a steady stream of customers was stopping by around noon Monday.
“People are so eager,” Cook said. “We’ve had to keep them from sitting down for so long. It’s nice to be able to do that again.”
In Beaufort and Port Royal, ‘it’s a start’
In Port Royal, a sign hung from the deck of Alvin Ord’s telling people driving past on Ribaut Road that the unassuming sandwich shop was open. On Paris Avenue, a few people sat on the deck at Corner Perk.
At Hemingway’s, Ellen O’Reilly was joined Monday by her sister Mary Louise O’Reilly and Mary Louise’s husband, Robert Bussa, who also live downtown and frequent its restaurants.
The early lunch-goers and a nearby couple were among the first sit-down customers in a month and a half for the row of restaurants overlooking Henry C. Chambers Waterfront Park.
Panini’s operated at a loss with curbside dining but stayed open to keep staff employed, Thompson said.
Employees continue to wear masks and gloves and equipment is sanitized.
Owner Thompson spent Sunday pressure washing the deck at Panini’s.
Outdoor dining doesn’t mark a return to normal cash flow, but it allows more people to return to work, he said.
“It’s a start,” Thompson said.
Three older men nursed beers on the back deck at Luther’s, as friends Rebecca Bass and Velma Polk, seated several feet apart at Common Ground coffee shop, caught up over lunch.
“I feel 10 years younger; my heart feels lighter,” Bass said. “And I’m just delighted to have the company of my really close friend.”
This story was originally published May 4, 2020 at 4:16 PM with the headline "‘It’s been a long 6 weeks:’ Some Beaufort Co. restaurants reopened patios Monday."
