'Bama here we come!
We have been blessed as parents with well behaved children in vehicles. It's so easy to save money on vacations and drive because Charly and Hayes have always traveled so well. While Hayes had his moments, mostly because he is struggling to stay asleep lately, this year was no different. They slept through the night, watched a few movies when they woke up, and worked through a number of activities and games Kelli planned for them.
I drove through Iowa and Missouri in the middle of the night and hit Memphis, Tennessee at 7 in the morning. Ugh! We planned on a picnic lunch at a lake in Mississippi but we (I) couldn't find it! So we settled for a different state park, Clarkco State Park just outside of Quitman, Mississippi.
Clarkco was impressive! It sits on over 815 acres, has lots of shelter, tall trees, a massive lake, a nice playground for the kids, and a splashpad. It was good to stretch our legs and walk around somewhere so picturesque but it was sweltering hot! 98 degrees!
After Clarkco, we had a 3 hour drive to the Gulf Shores. Traffic was slow on the Mississippi and Alabama highways but picked up in Mobile, Alabama as we reached it's Bay and (finally!) an interstate just outside of the Gulf Shores area.
After spending over 16 hours in the van (not counting stops), we were all a little ready to see the Gulf. We dropped our bags off at the condo after checking in, and were down on the beach in no time!
While the view from our condo (below) was impressive, the walk to the beach was longer than we thought (over 1/4 of a mile, according to the complex's website). The fine, white sand though was unlike any sand we'd seen before.
Personally, I loved the remote feel of Kure Beach, North Carolina last year and my initial feelings of Orange Beach (Gulf Shores) was that it was busier than I was anticipating. Instead of unique, colorful beach homes, the shore is lined with towering condominiums. It was a feeling I got used to pretty quickly, and came to really enjoy actually.
Charly and Hayes wasted no time digging in, and Kelli helped!
It had been over a year since any of us had seen water like this, and instantly, we realized just what we had missed and why we were longing for another beach vacation. We had enjoyed the clear water of Lake Michigan, the frothy waves of the Atlantic Ocean, and now we could have fun in the stunning aqua color of the Gulf of Mexico.
We built sandcastles, we ran in the waves, we played catch, but mostly we just admired the scene and looked forward to our next few days in Orange Beach.
This is the view from our 6th floor unit balcony. We ate all our lunches out here each day in Orange Beach and became rather fond of this site each morning greeting us.
We hung out on the beach the rest of that first afternoon and decided to check out Moe's Original BBQ on Perdido Beach Blvd. We were excited for all the seafood options the Gulf Shores had to offer, but also wanted to eat some BBQ while in Alabama. Moe's was rated #2 on Trip Advisor in Orange Beach and we agreed. It was awesome! We spent a good amount of time chatting with a young couple from Birmingham at Moe's (who were used to southern BBQ and confirmed how good Moe's was).
We went crab hunting on the beach when we returned at night. Crab hunting is a bit of a tradition in the Gulf Shores. Troves of families come out to the beach at night with flashlights hunting for ghost crabs, small white crabs that come out when the sun goes down and blend in with the sand. After a little while of searching, and not knowing exactly what we were looking for, Charly and I spotted not one, but two! We caught them in our nets, the kids had fun examining them, and then we let them go and called it a night.
We couldn't wait for the next few days of relaxing in the sun and after the long trip in the van, fell asleep pretty easily.
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