Last year after we took our Fall vacation to the beach we had decided our summer vacation would be DC. We had kind of been thinking we might do this same this year and take a non-beach vacation in the summer. Then covid hit and we decided that we would be safest at the beach, and who doesn't love the beach anyway?! All of us are always up for a beach trip!
We decided to go back down the Indian Rocks Beach (where we spent last Thanksgiving and my birthday). The only downside to going there is that it takes us about 12 hours...but it's worth it.
Here's our "We're on the road" picture!
We were so excited to get there that we decided to leave a day early and break up the trip. So going down we drove to Tallahassee and stopped for the night. This was the only picture I took in Tallahassee...and it's not a great one. We had a fun 1 night there. This picture was in our hotel room.
The next morning we got up and completed the drive to Indian Rocks.
We enjoyed a very, very relaxing week of sun, sand, and surf.
Digging...always digging.
Playing with the pinfish we caught in the cast net.
Carter lost a tooth at the beach! At home we have a cute little tooth pillow to put it in while you wait for the tooth fairy...at the beach you have to make due so we dropped his tooth in this cup. What a good tooth fairy-she came while he was sleeping, picked up his tooth, and left his cash!
Clayton loves beach snacks! We always buy junk food for the kids on vacation that they don't normally get, and Clayton probably enjoys this more than anyone.
Playing with the pin fish caught in the cast net.
Running in the surf.
Sandcastle construction.
We love staying in The Narrows at Indian Rocks because our condo is on the beach, but across the street there are no buildings just this view of the inland waters. So beautiful, and it makes for the most perfect morning runs to run along the inland waters. I always spend my runs thinking that I could totally live here.
An early morning beach walk searching for shells.
Back in November when we came down to IRB every morning we walked the beach and found tons of olive shells! This time we didn't find many olive shells, but the tradition of early beach walks for shells continued.
Smile for the camera...and this is what I get! He said he was showing me his muscles.
Also, I didn't get a good picture unfortunately, but Nora Kate and Clayton both got henna tattoos at John's Pass while we were here. You can barely see Clayton's shark on his left arm in this picture.
We (ie-mostly John) worked this 500 piece puzzle while we were there!
We love the beach!
Every time one of us got the casting net, one of these birds showed up waiting to get free food!
Of course Clayton wanted to try boogie boarding.
Caught a crab
One night we decided to drive the kids over the Sunshine Skyway Bridge. We read them the history of the bridge, some of which I didn't even know. We drove it at sunset and it was gorgeous! John drove over it going one direction. Then we turned around and I drove us back over it. Pretty and fun!
You can't go to IRB without going to the (stinky) Bird Sanctuary!
Catching lizzards.
The day after we returned from the beach was Father's Day, and since I knew that would be a busy day getting our stuff organized at home and picking up our new puppy (more on that in another post!) we decided to celebrate Father's Day at the beach. Before we went down to Florida, I reserved a fishing charter. We went out on a boat named The Parker with Captain Dave. It was just the 6 of us and the captain.
We left early in the morning and the water was pretty choppy! As in I was holding onto the boat and Clayton tightly as we were hitting the waves. BUT we saw the biggest sea turtle I've ever seen anywhere. It was just swimming right at the top of the ocean a few miles out. SO NEAT!
Our goal was to catch Spanish Mackeral, however we couldn't stop catching SHARKS! No joke...we caught them in a couple of different places between 9-11 miles off shore. Of course they fought like crazy reeling them in. They flopped around on the deck biting everything their mouths touched--the cooler, inside of the boat, etc. Thankfully the captain threw them back in for us.
Here's Dawson with one of his sharks.
Carter was the only one who actually managed to catch a mackerel! (Why is he holding it so close to NK's face though?! Brothers!) We caught some other various reef fish too that were fun.
We were so hot and tired after 5 plus hours out on the sea in the sun fishing that we all looked a little rough in this pic when we got back to the marina. BUT it was SO fun!
The kids like to buy finger puppets at the Bird Sanctuary. That's what Carter is holding up here.
This was a fantastic beach vacation. SO very relaxing. This was also much needed family time as work has been busy for John this year and we all just enjoyed the extra time together.
