Word on the street
What locals are saying
The Tavern at Rainbow Row earns its 1686 founding claim without much theatrics — the original hardwood floors, brick walls, and a back-room trap door leading to Prohibition-era smuggling tunnels are all still intact and fully visible. The selection runs deliberately local and rare: a five-grain bourbon distilled from a Carolina rice variety once thought extinct, regional moonshines, nothing you'd pull off a grocery-store shelf. The staff experience is the wildcard — at their best they function more like certified historians than clerks, delivering an impromptu tour alongside the tasting; at their worst, a sharp correction about the difference between a 'tavern' and a 'bar' has sent at least one visitor next door without buying a thing.
oldest liquor store in America, earnestly soProhibition tunnel and trap door still on viewCarolina rice bourbon and hard-to-find local spiritsfree daily tastings when the right person is workingprices reflect rarity, not tourist markupstaff hospitality varies sharply by shift
In the feed
