Vacation 2

Yesterday, the 12th, I got up before the sunrise so I could get myself down to the beach to watch it.  It always takes me a couple days here before I can get up for it.  It always amazes me how fast the sun comes up once it peeks over the horizon.

*****

September 13

Today although the forecast was saying sunny and 80.  It is very cloudy & windy.  When the sun does peak out it is probably 80!  I went for a very long walk this  morning and along the shore was a huge, dead sea turtle.  I called Paul and told him to get down there with the camera!  I heard one of the others standing by saying they had called it in.  Which I assume meant to some authority to come and remove it and or document it.

When we here last year, we saw a couple of the NEST volunteers watching/guarding a turtle nest.

I did sit at the beach for a few hours today reading State of Wonder

It's really good!!

Tomorrow is Friday.  

We leave Saturday. 

 How can this be? 

We just got here.

******
September 14

Our last day on the beach.  The weather was perfect.  The water warm, the waves huge (a little too huge for me, thank you very much).

I finished my book.  We went out for dinner.
We got our stuff packed up.
It was the fastest vacation yet-and we did next to nothing.

I'm already dreaming of next year!

Vacation 1

I'm always trying to make my vacations longer. So at the last minute-the night before we were leaving-I spent about an hour re-figuring our route to the Outer  Banks.  I thought a couple hours at Monticello would break of the trip nicely and we would definitely avoid any delays onto OBX. 

Unfortunately, the weather was cloudy/rainy and we decided not to go the alternate route and take the chance of it being soggy at Monticello.

The further south and east we traveled the better the weather became and I, of course, started second guessing our decision.  

About 2 miles before we crossed the Wright Memorial Bridge onto the Outer Banks it started to drizzle and then the deluge.

It's a good thing Paul has super 'eyes'.  

The worries over traffic were unfounded.   Sunday here it was still drizzly so we drove down to Roanoke Island and toured The Elizabethan Gardens.  I enjoy it tremendously.

We also went through the Ft. Raleigh History center, which adjoined the gardens.  It was quite interesting.  The next time we come during the summer season, I do want to see The Lost Colony production.  

It's very quiet here now that summer season is over.  We spent Monday at the beach, our new Sport-brella is fantastic.  We saw a couple families with them last year and thought it would work for us.  

It's very windy here now so this is perfect-keeps us out of the wind and sand.  I think our regular umbrella would have been inside out in two minutes or half way to Bermuda by now.

I had fun boogie boarding.  

The waves are crazy big.  

****

On Tuesday morning while taking my morning long walk on the beach, I found these.

The one on the left is a whelk of some sort.  I could not believe when I saw it just sitting there in the sand!  I bought a book later that day on sea shells.  There are over 140 varieties in North Carolina waters!!  I wouldn't have guessed there was that many in the world.  wow.