Breweries
Craft brewers are liking the 29405 zip code in recent years. Most offer regular tastings, some offer tours and a number stage special events. They include Holy City, Snafu, Lo Fi, Freehouse, Rusty Bull, Coast, Commonhouse Aleworks and Pawleys Island Brewing. Distilleries are popping up, too. Striped Pig can be found on East Montague and Firefly will soon adorn Spruill Avenue.
Carolina Ice Palace
Ice skating on the Carolina coast? It's real. Meet up with locals or folks who moved here from Buffalo for skating. Join an adult pick-up ice hockey league. The Ice Palace can be found in a North Charleston shopping center off Northwoods Boulevard.
Coliseum area
The city’s massive North Charleston Coliseum and Performing Arts Center draws big-name musical acts, theater, monster trucks, circuses and major conventions to the Lowcountry. The coliseum also hosts the S.C. Stingrays hockey team.
Festivals
The North Charleston Arts Festival, 4th of July celebration and the Christmas parade are all free opportunities to get out in a crowd and have some fun. If there’s a change of season, a cultural holiday or a theme people can get behind (such as classic cars or barbecue), there’s going to be a festival.
Goose Creek Reservoir
Head down Bettis Boat Landing Road for the best public access to Goose Creek Reservoir, a popular spot for freshwater fishing, birding, kayaking and recreational boating. The 600-acre dammed lake is home to bass, bream and crappie, plenty of large alligators, and nesting areas for snowy egrets and white ibis.
Neighborhood community centers
Community centers are a social hub in many North Charleston neighborhoods, offering activities and classes that range from after-school reading clubs to ballroom dancing to dog training.
Olde Village
East Montague Avenue has become the "it" place in North Charleston, bustling with popular restaurants and bars, and a theater. The commercial strip is one reason Olde Village and Park Circle have been attracting younger residents. And while you're in the neighborhood, circle around to Spruill Avenue, where restaurants like The CodFather and FOOD on Spruill breathe life into an industrial strip.
Park Circle
Aptly named Park Circle (it’s a circular park) sits at the heart of North Charleston’s original city boundaries, walking distance from the East Montague strip. There are ballfields, a disc golf course that rings the circle and a community center in the center. Park Circle is a regular setting for festivals and events, and a seasonal farmers market.
Riverfront Park
Set on the banks of the Cooper River, the North Charleston park features a large boardwalk, fishing sites, charcoal grills, a covered pavilion and picnic tables next to a playground and water fountains. It’s also home to the Greater Charleston Naval Base Memorial and the National Outdoor Sculpture Exhibit. Take a walk through history as you stroll underneath massive live oaks and pass several historic 19th-century homes that once belonged to leaders of the Navy. Public park hours are daylight to dark unless otherwise scheduled. Access is off Hobson Avenue on the former Charleston Naval Base.