vacation

Drew and I have been battling bronchitis (and have matching antibiotic regimens! Isn't that too sweet for words?), which is why I've been lax in updating the blog. So, to catch up on the last two weeks:

We had a lovely if way-too-short (as usual) vacation in the Outer Banks. Drew was coughing uncontrollably the Wednesday that we were supposed to have left, so we left on Thursday instead -- thereby putting into danger all the stuff I had planned for us: kayaking in the Sound, an all-day trip to Ocracoke, a visit to the flight museum and plenty of beach time. We left later Thursday than we wanted to, but neither of us was in any shape to get up early and leave with the sunrise.

We stopped for an early-ish dinner at a great place called Southland on the NC border after we ran into traffic around Hampton Roads, which means we didn't get to PopPop and Mammaw's until nearly bedtime. I took NyQuil the entire time we were there, which enabled me to sleep while Drew shook the bed trying to conceal his coughing. Rachel, of course, completely avoided getting sick.

On Friday, we went to the beach. It was the absolutely perfect beach day -- warm but not too hot, and the water was the ideal temperature -- refreshing but not too cold. Rachel and I spent most of the day in the water, she jumping over waves near the shore and me catching her as she tried to jump over the waves. One time I didn't manage it and she got a good scare going underwater, then ran back to our blanket and covered her body with a towel, shaking and sobbing. I sympathized with her a bit, but then told her the best way to get over it was to get right back in the water, which she did. I didn't want her to come away traumatized by the ocean, and she seemed to recover quickly.

PopPop and Mammaw cooked a grilled chicken dinner that night and had a lovely surprise for Drew -- an ice-cream cake from Carvel, yay!! and Rachel and I gave him his 50th birthday gifts: a new Daddy Tool (Swiss Army knife) and two pairs of cargo shorts, one of which was unfortunately too big and had to be returned (which Drew did this past weekend).

The next day was windy, and so we all went to the aquarium (at Rachel's request). It's quite a good one considering that it's far from a big city, and the best part for me was to watch the turtle recovery efforts -- I told Drew that if we lived in the Outer Banks, I'd definitely volunteer for turtle rescue duty -- those critters are big, and they look very friendly. We had lunch there and then headed home with the idea that we'd go to the flight museum. But then Rachel announced that she wanted to take a nap, and I was tired, too (from being sick or from allergies; at the point I had no idea what it was except that I was sneezing and coughing), so we crashed for about an hour or so before dinner.

PopPop and Mammaw took us to an excellent seafood restaurant with great cocktails and we all had a  nice time looking at the sunset. Rachel was very disappointed when we told her we weren't going to get dessert there, so I gave in and said, sure, order the Hershey's chocolate cake (which was way too sweet, even though I had only one or two bites). We got home, put her to bed, and then Drew and I watched some episodes of "House of Cards" together.

The next day we had a good breakfast and took our time about leaving, since we stopped at a recently reopened lighthouse hoping to walk the 100+ steps to the top. You have to buy tickets, and to kill time before we walked upstairs, we walked a path out to the estuary where they had a lookout, and you could see herons and the ocean beyond -- absolutely lovely. By the time of our tour, it was 1 p.m. and the temperature inside the lighthouse was 104 degrees, so they closed it to walkers. So disappointing, but there was nothing to be done. We told Rachel we'd just have to come back sometime, which we will do next year because, as I told Drew, we are spending more time visiting PopPop and Mammaw if we have to cancel Oregon to do it. It's totally worth the relaxation time!

The ride home was almost totally traffic-free because it was a Sunday evening. We ate dinner at a lovely little restaurant in Fredricksburg (must explore more of that town!) and then got home around 10, got to sleep at 11:30, and then we all slept in the next day. Drew took Rachel to a baseball game (the Mets won!) and I went to work.

Altogether, a wonderful (yet, as usual, too-short) vacation!