Sweet Vacation Alabama

Sam and I took the kids to Gulf Shores in July for vacation.  It's a 13 hour drive, so on the way down, we split the drive into two days.  We stopped on the way out of Illinois in Metropolis to see Superman.  Once we arrived, we found our condo: a cozy one-bedroom across the street from the beach.  I was super excited to take the kids to see the beach for the first time.  We made our way over and they thought it was cool, but were a little hesitant at first.  By the end of the week, we had to literally drag them off the beach crying.

While we were there, we also went go-cart driving.  The track was wooden and circled up and up and up.  Sam even rescued a dolphin (stuffed) that someone had lost on the track.  Speaking of dolphins, we took a boat ride around the bay and saw real dolphins.  You can see the fins in the photos (near a small fishing boat).  It was nearly impossible to get a good pic of them. 

We went to a place called The Hangout.  Super fun place!  Other than it being a little pricey, I highly recommend it for kids and/or adults.  We went one morning for the pirates and princess breakfast.  Eva declared she'd be a Pirate Princess-that's my girl, maybe she can have it both ways.  We was rocking the eye patch and head wrap, along with a wand.  She and Patrick went on a treasure hunt and came back with gold and lots of fun memories.  On another night, we went back to The Hangout for a late dinner.  We had a 45 minute wait, so we went out to the beach in the dark with glow bracelets.  It was fun for the kids to run around and fling those bracelets hither and yon.  We went back in for dinner and dancing at the table.  Fun fun!

Another highlight was the pier.  Gulf Shores Pier goes about a quarter mile in to the ocean and was very cool.  It was my favorite part of the trip.  Despite a LOT of fisherman and fish guts, the walk was beautiful.  We went at sunset and got some great photos of the family.

I can't forget to mention that on the way down, we drove through Huntsville, Alabama.  In case you didn't know, like me, this is where NASA Space Camp is located.  We found it and Sam was in heaven.  We even took a photo of him to show that he finally made after 25 years of dreaming about it!  We tried to show the kids the cool space ships and rockets, but they were wholly uninterested.

We made the trip in one day; we left at 10a and arrived home around 11:30p.  Phew!  The kids were really great in the car.  All in all, we had a great trip!  To see all of the pics of our trip, follow me.