My sister and her family invited me to go with them on their spring break vacation this year in Oceanside, CA. Umm... a week at a beach house... yes, yes I'm in!
My sister's family is so much fun and it was a blast traveling with them. This trip consisted of going to the pool in the morning and the beach in the afternoon or vice versa and then spending our evenings cooking a big delicious dinner, playing games, watching movies and walking along the boardwalk. Usually when I travel I am constantly on the go; this trip was still fun filled but very relaxing too.
We stayed at North Coast Village which was right on the beach. We basically drove there, parked and then didn't get back in the car until it was time to drive back to Utah. The vistas were in a perfect location; right on the beach and only a 15 minute walk one way to the pier and a 10 minute walk the other way to the harbor. With the vistas right on beach, going back for lunch or potty breaks was never a big deal. I even got up and went running along the board walk every morning.
One of the nights we decided not to cook and walked over to the pier to eat at Ruby's Diner. I've always liked the Ruby's Diners I've eaten at; it's usually a fun 50s atmosphere, near or over the ocean and delicious after a long day in the sun.
Like I said, we spent our days outside. Some days we ended up staying at the beach the entire day. I spent a lot of my time reading on the beach but I did get into the ocean one day to boogie board. It was SO cold but well worth it. (I may have squealed and laughed the entire time)
A huge highlight of the beach was THE HOLE! As we were driving down to California I told my nieces and nephew that we should dig a hole... a BIG one, like the one Joey digs on FRIENDS. Well, they were determined to do it and SUCCEEDED by 200%! Every day the hole kept getting bigger and bigger (with a little help from myself and my brother-in-law, but only a little). Eventually it was about 4 1/2 feet deep and 3 feet wide. People would walk by and be like, "Whoooooooa!" My favorite two reactions were first: a group of high school football player looking guys being SHOCKED that little kids dug that big of a hole all by themselves. The second: a lady walking by, gasping, and saying, "Oh my goodness, there is a child in there" as she saw my little nephew sitting down in there playing in the sand.
The pool was just fun for swimming around, showing off our "diving" skills, playing keep away with my Australian beach ball (shaped like a rugby ball which kept catching a phantom current and we'd have to swim the length of the pool to get it back), and playing hands-up stands-up (you know, surprisingly that game is a lot easier as an adult).
One of our walks over to the harbor consisted of finding miracle flip flops and eating pizza and calamari at a Mafia owned restaurant. My nephew had left his flip flops, one day, on the beach and high tide took them away. We went over to the harbor and searched all of the souvenir shops for some flip flops only to find nothing. Finally I said I would check this hole in the wall "grocery store," even though we were positive they wouldn't have any and to my surprise there was one pair of little boys flip flops. We called them the miracle flip flops the rest of the trip. We then ate dinner at a pizza place that we are certain was owned by the mafia because all of the workers fit the stereo type of mafia members and the cook looked like the big hauncho of the mafia. We were having a blast making up their mafia stories. My brother-in-law decided to order calamari for an appetizer and we had a lot of fun squealing as we all tried it.
I loved this trip. I liked that we played hard but yet it was very relaxed. I also liked that we didn't drive the car the entire week and not once was I bored or felt like I had cabin fever.
Watching the Sunset
No comments:
Post a Comment