Vacation: Rides

Last year when we went to the beach, the girls went on their first merry-go-round ride, and fell in love. There's a big shopping/food/entertainment complex near where we stay, with a big merry-go-round, so I figured we'd be spending a lot of our time there.

On our first "need a break from the beach" day, we went to the outlets for a little while, and then went to the giant ferris wheel in Myrtle Beach.

Julie in the Sky Wheel

Afterwards, we were trying to decide what to do, and rather than go all the way back, we went to the other big shopping/food/entertainment complex called Broadway at the Beach.  I'd kind of written it off after last year - expensive, and not all that different than the closer one.

But it's all in the details, of course ... There are more rides at Broadway, and the girls are a year older now.  All the stuff that they weren't old enough for last year was just perfect for this year.  We had so much fun the first time that we went back again on Friday.  These pictures are a mix of both days.  We got wristbands for unlimited rides, and made sure we got our money's worth.  :)

There are two sections of rides:  one is a section of newer rides, and the other is a section where they moved some rides from an old amusement park that used to be on the beach.  The old section had some  rides that I remember as a kid...  the motorcycles and dune buggies.  Good times.

Remember these?

Hot air balloon Ferris Wheel 

Tea cups 

I think these cars were their absolute favorites, the ones that whip around the corners.  They would get on and stay on until we made them come off.   These remind me of a ride I used to go on with my cousins at a carnival behind my grandmother's house.

 There were 2 merry go rounds - one in the old section and one in the new.

This is the new one.

The older one

 Train!

 Boats.  I remember these.  :)  We totally ran them ragged on the rides.  This picture is really blurry, but by this point, Emma was so exhausted.  She's just trying to hold her head up here. 

 This one was called Willie the Whale.

Old school motorcycles.  It was really dark over there, so not many non-blurry photos.

Sand Castles

The ladies put Daddy and Papa to work.  Of course, I'm not sure who had more fun...

Rebecca spent a whole lot of time in the sand earlier in the week, when she was terrified of the ocean.  She got pretty good at getting a sand castle out of the bucket.

Emma burying Daddy's feet in the sand.  I don't think it will be to much longer until they start wanting to entirely bury Daddy in the sand.  But this year, just feet.

Shells

One morning, my parents took the girls out early to collect some shells.  They gave them little mesh bags to collect them in. 

My view from the 19th floor

Dad's picture of Emma and Julie

They used their shells (well, and shovels) to write their "names" in the sand.  Papa tried to trick them earlier in the week.  He snuck down and wrote their letters and told them that it was the fish.  Emma and Julie may have fallen for it, but Becca wasn't buying it.  "No, Papa, you did it."

My dad had been also trying to get the girls up to see the sunrise.  I'm not sure if Emma was up for sunrise this morning, but the two of them set out for the beach really early, while the rest of us were still asleep.  He got some pictures that I just love.

They started playing with the shells while we were still at the beach.  They were "cooking" them up in bowls and serving us lots of pieces of broken shells.

A few more notes about the ocean, though I'm "officially" done with that section.

We were right at the pier, so there were a couple of times that we got word of "sharks."  I never saw any, never saw anyone catch one, never saw any signs of them.  But the mere mention of them can really put a damper on an ocean day.

Another random story:  I was sitting down at the tide line with Emma, "catching" water in a bucket and just sitting in the sand while the waves rolled in.  There were a whole bunch of little ...  well, I don't really know what they are.  Mussels?  They're about the size of a fingernail, and once the waves roll back out, they stick out their little foot and dig themselves back down into the sand.  Well, I started pulling them out of the sand to try to show her the foot.  She freaked!  "Don't DO THAT!" in this deep, angry voice.

The Beach, part 2

So, on the first day of "suwf" boards, Emma and Julie tried it, but Becca wouldn't go near the water.  Julie "suwf"ed for a little while, and then she was done with it.  Emma pretty much fell in love with it, as long as someone was holding her hand.

We took a little bit of a break from the beach, in part because the girls weren't crazy about it, in part because I needed a break from the sun, and in part because the girls figured out that sand meant that they had to take a bath.  I'm not sure how long we stuck to the pool, but I don't have any more pictures from the beach until the following Saturday.  Actually, they're my dad's pictures.  Apparently I didn't take my camera to the beach that day.

Julie

My dad spent a lot of time with Rebecca, trying to get her comfortable with the water.  Lots of showing her that the waves were only little by the time they got to her.  And somehow, he convinced her.  By the end of that day, she was running into the waves, maybe even a little further than we would have liked.  I would have never expected it, given how terrified she was.

By later in the afternoon, we had them all boogie boarding on their bellies in the shallow water.  We had to hold the boogie boards while they got on, and then push them when a wave came along, but they were loving it.

At the end of the day, Julie and Emma wanted to go back to the pool?  But Becca?  Who had been all about the pool all week long?  She wanted to keep boogie boarding on the beach.  Seriously, I can't believe the turn around.  I'm so proud of her for overcoming such a big fear.

Vacation: The Beach

We had pretty much perfect weather all week long - low 80s, and lots of sun.  There was a storm that rolled through on Saturday night, but long after we were all tucked into bed.

I'm not quite sure how to sort through all of the photos to tell a story.  Chronologically just isn't going to work here.  So I'm going to attempt to group my thoughts and photos by 'venture.

The beach = sand + shells + ocean.  Three totally different aspects.

Sand?  They all loved sand.

And shells?  We're pretty big fans of those, too.

But the ocean?  The ocean was a whole other story.  At first, this was about as close as they would get.

On Day 2, we brought out the boogie boards ("suwf boards"), thinking that it might get them a little closer to the water.

We practiced on the sand.

And the sand was as far as Rebecca got.  She was pretty much terrified of the ocean.  She wouldn't go close enough to even get her toes wet.  When she wanted to wash the sand off her hands, someone had to go get a bucket of water for her.

Julie and Emma finally made it down to the water.  They'd stand on their boards as long as we held their hands.

Becca, still up on shore.

More soon...