The Carolinas!

South Carolina Coast and Wilmington, North Carolina

Huntington and Myrtle Beach State Parks
April 22-May 1

We have spent the past 9 days in the Myrtle Beach area.  We have previously planned to just spend 5 days...but the weather report called for lots of rain in Virginia Beach...so we decided to stay!!  Who wouldn't rather be at the beach in the sun than in the rain??  We celebrated Curt's 40th birthday with a trip into Myrtle Beach and out to lunch.  It was a fun city...lots of things to do.  It is a huge tourist area for the East coast.  

Many of the state parks have had great nature centers in the campgrounds. We had the chance to watch the rangers feed all their animals...this little turtle was so cute!!

Myrtle beach has more minature golf courses than anywhere in the world...so we had to play!!  Everyone got a hole in one on some hole...which was exciting.

We had some great beach days...the boys are loving skim boarding and boogie boarding.  When the tide went out it formed these really fun lakes of water that they boys had so much fun playing in, perfect depth for skim boarding tricks.  

 We had an unexpected trip to Wilmington, North Carolina last night.  There was very bad storms coming our way that may have included hail, strong winds or tornadoes.   We headed up to a hotel that had concrete walls and was farther away from the storm.  Thankfully, we barely had a drop of rain and had a great visit in Wilmington.  We had a chance to tour the U.S.S. North Carolina, a battleship used in World War 2.  It was one of the best tours we have been on.  You got to explore all 9 levels of this massive ship and really get a taste of what life was like for the brave sailors.  We tried to decide what our favorite jobs on the ship might be...Curt would want to work in the general store, I wanted to be the signal flag raiser, and the boys for sure didn't want to be the dishwasher, potato peeler or sheet ironer for the 2,000 + men aboard.  My "Papa", the boys great grandpa served in the Navy during World War 2, so we had fun remembering him and the great man that he was to us and his service to our country.  We think there was a chance he even did some mechanical work on this ship while it was in Hawaii...where he spent alot of time during the war.  

Another highlight of our time in Wilmington was seeing one of my former first grade students at University of North Carolina Wilmington.  He is just finishing his junior year, and is an awesome swimmer there.  Adam gave us a great tour of the campus and the swimming pool.  It takes so much dedication and time to be a swimmer...often practicing 2 hours every morning and 3 hours every afternoon.  WOW!!  I was so proud of him...he was so sweet to take time before finals week to show us around. 

This campground activity cracked me up...the boys spent hours at our last campground playing basketball with their mini hoop that was tied to the tree outside the trailer. 

Next we are heading north to Virginia Beach on the Chesapeake Bay to explore the first English colonies at Jamestown.  Have a great weekend!