Neil’s cub scout troop had a family camp out at Sunset Beach on March 8th, and of course we went. Kelly loves camping, and she loves the beach, and combining the two was like a dream come true for her. Neil could hang out with other boys and do boy stuff. Me, I got to drive the car and set up the tent.
Sunset Beach is actually two beaches down from the southern-most beach we usually go to, Seacliff Beach. And what a difference going further seemed to make. On Sunset Beach, we could find seashells and sand dollars, even a hermit crab or two (which Kelly pretended to be afraid of.) The beaches we go to are bereft of such treasures, probably because they’ve been stripped clean by the hundreds of others who come there.
The beach was about 1/4 mile from the campground, and required walking down a long row of steps, and then over some dunes, but it was still close enough that we could hear the ocean at night in our tent. And most of the time, Kelly and I were at the beach.
She actually went ahead of me with another parent while I was setting up the tent, and when I joined her, she frolicked until dusk and dinnertime.
The next morning, even though it felt awfully cold, we went down before breakfast; and after breakfast we went down some more.
Like I said, it was like Kelly’s ultimate experience: beach, eating s’mores, sleeping in a tent, beach, s’mores, beach. She was just unhappy we had to break camp and go home.
As an aside, I once went to the beach with a friend. She and her sons somehow managed to come off the beach with nary a grain of sand on them. I can’t understand that. This was Kelly on our last walk back from Sunset beach:
Neil, Kelly or I (Kelly and me especially) always come back dripping sand. It was an issue for my sandless friend, since she was driving, and she asked us to shower ourselves off before going back to her car. It really didn’t work. We’ve never carpooled to the beach again.