tonight i was thinking about how our week at the beach flew by. then i realized, these past 2 weeks (post-beach) have also flown by! so then i realized if i didn't hurry up and do a blog post about it soon, i just may forget how wonderful it was!
rivers pondering his thoughts... hmmm, let me think.
feeding the sea gulls.
of course, anytime that i'm off of work & free of any responsibilities (other than caring for myself and son) is a wonderful time! even if i had just spent the week at home. we had an absolutely gorgeous week of weather - did you know that september is a fantastic time in the outer banks? all of the children are back in school (including the high schoolers, college kids, etc.) and the beach was full of young families (such as ourselves) and older, retired grandparents (such as my parents)! no offense mom & dad in calling you "older" and "retired" because i know you both are young at heart and work your tails off!!
rivers made a friend named tommy from new jersey. (i tried not to hold that against him or his parents, but new jersey drivers are horrible, which makes me less partial to people from new jersey! i know this for a fact b/c a new jersey driver side swiped my car in the food lion parking lot.) anyway, tommy won the award for "most outgoing" on the beach. he made friends up and down the beach - didn't want to be away from his new friends - and continued to disobey his parents to go play with his new friends. it was interesting to watch! tommy was 2.5 years old & while you could tell him & rivers were in the same age range, tommy certainly was faster, sneakier, and more rambunctious than rivers. could just be a personality thing (which i'm hoping is the case), or it could just be that's what i have to look forward to in the next 6 months or so. rivers was only half way interested in his new friend. if tommy came over to our blanket/umbrella/little-piece-of-beach, rivers was happy to share his toys & play. otherwise, rivers didn't care. he certainly didn't care to go to tommy's blanket/umbrella/little-piece-of-beach even after being invited. (he did finally give in on our last day to the invite, only b/c tommy asked to take one of his trucks over.) so while rivers may not get the most popular award, he did get the award for "cutest toddler" and "best eyes" and "best behaved" on the beach. :) really, gold medals were given at the end of our week! ;) (ok no, not really! but that would have been fun if they did!)
here are some other noteworthy things from our beach vacation...
- we saw a HUGE family of dolphin one day when the water was so still & peaceful. it was almost erie how calm the water was. but it made the dolphin so easy to see! they were fairly close to shore & they swam from south to north. we saw soooo many and then finally before they were all gone, one dolphin jumped clear out of the water - we saw its whole body jump up - just like we were at sea world! it was awesome!
- we saw a cat fight (and i don't mean the stray cats that live there)! from what we could gather, it was probably 2 sisters. but these were grown women - probably somewhere between mine & jeremy's age. they seriously went at it - fists were going & everything! and right on the beach!! how do you get into a fist fight with someone on a beautiful, peaceful beach?! apparently, one of them didn't like the others "attitude".
- we saw red fox. this is nothing new - they were there last year as well. they are native to the area & have made a home for themselves under the condos. luckily, they don't bother anyone & scurry away as soon as they see you.
- we saw a lifeguard rescue. this was actually pretty entertaining. let me start by saying - there were huge sandbars in the ocean all week & since i am a land lover this was perfect for me. i was able to go in the ocean, but stay mostly dry, and stay away from any potential predators (ie- sharks!). so one afternoon, jeremy, dad, alex, and myself were just standing out on a sandbar, enjoying the day & chatting. (rivers and mom were back at the condo napping!) we had been watching a guy out on a huge raft all morning (i'm talking this thing looked like an air mattress!) and at one point we saw him give all his "empties" to his girlfriend/wife/sister whoever she was. anyway, it was many cans of empty beer! so we knew he'd been drinking most of the day. at this point he's chatting with a friend, all the while his raft is floating away. in between the sand bars were strong rip currents. the lifeguards kept the areas well marked so people knew not to swim there. his raft made its ways to a rip current & pretty quick was taken out to sea. it wasn't until this point that his "friend" mentions his raft has floated away. the men say their good-byes & the friend goes back to the beach, collects his stuff, and leaves (what a great friend!). so then the man starts swimming out to catch his raft. at first we were all in disbelief - no way is he going to go get that thing. then we were in disbelief b/c he actually was going for it! it was soooo far out - i couldn't believe how fast that current took it! first of all, it would take an excellent swimmer, someone in amazing shape, who has trained for long distance swimming to swim that far out & make it back alive. second, anyone who had been drinking as much as this guy has a 0% success rate. if it hadn't been for the lifeguards who were out in the water already with their jet skies doing practice runs, we would have witnessed a drowning. luckily, a lifeguard saw this idiot (i'm sorry but i have no sympathy for drunk ignorance) and rescued both the man, as well as his raft. as a side note, the woman he was with was still out on the beach, but had her back to the ocean the whole time & missed all of this!
- we saw a WHALE!!! did you know it has been my dream forever to witness a whale out in the wild?! sure i've seen them at sea world, but that's not the same. i barely saw it, but i did catch a glimpse & i feel so honored that i did! jeremy actually spotted it first. i was in the shower & came running outside with just a towel around me. it would bob up to the surface, blow out a huge gush of water, and then continue on. i was able to see some black & white coloring. at first we thought it was an orca, but then thought what would an orca be doing in NC? after we returned home, jeremy looked it up & found that it was most likely a minke whale. they are mostly black, with some white coloring & are native to this area. they are of course, pretty rarely seen so close to shore. just as quick as he came, he went back out to sea. one really neat thing was all the pelicans & seagulls that were following it! there was a huge flock of birds flying above the whale. it was remarkable!! we spotted it on our last day at the beach. what a way to end our vacation!
and i can't forget to mention - we also celebrated jeremy's 34th birthday while at the beach! i told him he's officially old in my eyes! :) (i just like giving him a hard time b/c we're 6 years apart!)
if you'd like to see more pictures from our vacation, you can click here! enjoy!!
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