Anyway, we got down to the
beach around 9 AM beach time (10 AM back home) and set up camp for the
day. The next few hours were spent
playing in the sand, playing in the waves, and laying out and reading my
book. Heaven.
A little after noon, we left
all of our beach equipment by the water and we headed up to the room to make a
quick lunch of sandwiches, fruit, and chips.
Once we were done eating, we headed straight back down for several more
hours. The kids loved it so much, I
think they would have been perfectly content eating lunch on the beach, but I
wanted them to get a little break from the sun since it was so hot. We barely saw any clouds the entire trip!
The thing that the kids
loved the absolute most this year was finding shells. In the past, we’ve always found a few to
bring home, but this year they were pretty much on the hunt nonstop. B was a master shell-finder this year, too,
and he even found a few live sand dollars!
We put them back in the ocean, of course. :o)
Around 3-ish we decided it
was about time to head up to the room for the day. The kids got their baths and then they
relaxed on the couch and watched cartoons on Netflix (so nice that we were able
to get it to work in our room!) while B and I got ready.
We headed out around 4:30 PM
beach time (5:30 PM back home) so we could have an early dinner before the
crowds settled in for the evening. We
decided to spend that evening in Rosemary Beach, the quaintest little town I
think I’ve ever seen! It was about a
five minute drive from our condo to Rosemary and then we set out to find some
food.
Rosemary Beach is one of the
most picturesque little beach towns that I’ve ever seen! All of the architecture is stunning, there
are big beautiful trees shading all of the streets, and there are little shops
and restaurants on every corner with outdoor seating underneath strings of
lights. People walk or bike everywhere
and everyone is just so friendly. If I
ever win the lottery, the first thing I’m going to do is snatch up a beach
house right smack on the beach there!
We had our hearts (and
tummies) set on Southside Slice (pizza), but we strolled around for a bit to
take in the sights before heading that way.
The post office is right in the heart of Rosemary Beach and it was a big
beautiful white building with the cutest little courtyard so we headed into the
courtyard to take some pictures. Jacob
was being a grumpy pants (or more like a hangry pants) so he wouldn’t cooperate
for pictures at all. And by not
cooperating I don’t just mean not smiling… he wouldn’t even open his eyes. Lol. He
did happen to find a tree to climb after that which perked him up a bit, so I
was able to get a few shots of him looking dapper in his crisp blue shorts and
lime green polo… and with his eyes open.
;o)
Just as we were getting
ready to head out, a nice lady and her daughter came strolling through and she
offered to take a picture of our whole family, which I thought was so
sweet! Jacob actually cooperated for the
stranger, so I guess we just need to get strangers to take our pictures more
often!
We walked over to the pizza
place after that because we didn’t want to press our luck and have the kids get
even hangrier than they already were. Southside
Slice was the cutest little pizza place EVER and the pizza was delicious. The menu was on tiny individual chalkboards,
they had a huge selection of craft beers (our favorite!), and it had a sort of
hipster vibe to it. Not to mention they played
90’s pop music the entire time we were there.
Could that be any more
perfect?! #BoyzIIMen4Evah
We ordered the largest pizza
they had and topped it with pepperoni and sausage and B and I tried two of the
craft beers (we both agreed that his was the better one), and we were shocked
when they brought the pizza out because… it was MASSIVE. Haha.
We ended up putting a good
dent in it, and then we headed back outside to stroll around Rosemary Beach
some more to walk off all of those calories.
The kids climbed up on the bench outside of the post office so I snapped
a couple of pictures of them. Those
faces! They were much happier with full
bellies. ;o)
After that, we walked down
the street to the town square. They were
having some kind of family friendly event that evening and there was face painting
and a couple of other activities for the kids.
We snuck a quick peek at the beach and then we headed back to the
car. We had promised the kids that we
would go to Pier Park
in Panama City
The drive into PCB was
pretty quick and we headed straight down to the beach just outside of Pier Park
After we watched the sun
set, we headed back up to Pier Park where we let the kids pick out souvenirs
from the Toy Store (AKA junk store) there.
Lol. B and I were tripping out
because the toys were clearly not made in the USA
After we left the toy store, we stopped for shaved ice for the kids and then B ducked into Kilwin’s to grab ice creams for the two of us. The line was ridiculously long so there was quite a long wait, but I got to have my beloved s’mores ice cream and it was worth the wait!
After we left the toy store, we stopped for shaved ice for the kids and then B ducked into Kilwin’s to grab ice creams for the two of us. The line was ridiculously long so there was quite a long wait, but I got to have my beloved s’mores ice cream and it was worth the wait!
Upon arrival, we had noticed
that a huge sky wheel was under construction right where the kids’ beloved
carnival once was, and we were all pretty bummed that the carnival was
gone. We’ve been going to that carnival
every single year since Jacob was teeny tiny so the kids were pretty disappointed
that we wouldn’t be able to continue the tradition. They did have a new feature – bumper boats –
nearby instead, though, so we let the kids ride those a couple of times since
they couldn’t do their carnival things.
By the time the second round
of bumper boats was over it was already 8:45 local time which meant that it was
9:45 back home, so it was waaaay past the kids’ bedtimes. We hopped in the car, made the short drive
back to our condo, and the kids were both out cold in mere minutes! That’s what the beach will do to you, I
suppose!
