OBX FTW

I’d forgotten how much we like going to the beach.

As far back as I can remember, I’ve spent some time at the ocean almost every summer. One of my earliest memories is being at the beach with my parents, riding in the basket on the front of Dad’s bike and ‘helping’ mom make sandwiches for lunch. That might have been Ocean City or Myrtle Beach; I know it was in a big old beach house and I dimly remember being with another family. In grade school the beach was a weekend boat ride away on an island; in high school, my family went to Wildwood every year. In college, any nice summer day was an excuse tossing a beach bag in the car for the early morning drive to the Jersey shore and spending a day (or two) at the beach, coming home sandy and sunburnt and thoroughly satisfied with life. When J and I started dating we went to the beach often, and for several years after we were married we took a regular vacation week at Rehoboth Beach every summer with all the friends and family we could fit into the rental house.

Once we got the RV, we went everywhere but the shore! Making up for pent up demand, I think. The money we had been spending on a week at the shore went further at inland campgrounds, and we wanted to see new and different things. So it wasn’t until this year that we actually got to the beach in summer again. And even that was kind of a fluke, based on having to be near Raleigh at the end of July.

( on the Outer Banks and in Rodanthe )