Saturday, June 22, 2013

Mississippi Gulf Coast Vacation #2

This has gotten a little ridiculous.  It's now the 22nd of June, and with the final push to finish up the house, the many to-dos that come long with spring and summer, the new projects that may be coming up, and the many other excuses I could provide, this diary has fallen far behind.  

On this hot Summer morning, with the massive solstice moon set, the kids playing in their rooms, annaliese's feet bandaged after she dropped a bottle of milk on the kitchen floor, and the temperature approaching 90 degrees at 9:30 am, this feels like a fair reason to stay in the air conditioned sun room and play on the computer.

To catch up, we're going to go at a fast clip.

Driving down to the Mississippi coast in Boatie, we stopped for a catfish dinner in a local all-you-can-eat fried buffet, that also featured a big business in diet pills.  The signage was about 50/50, greasy food to diet pills.  I'm not sure if it was tongue in cheek, both businesses seemed to be doing well.  


We stayed at a quaint motel built in the 50s, a block back from the beach, ten units total, big pool under huge live oaks in the back, kitchenette in the room.  It was relaxed and comfortable.


We took a long drive on Sunday morning trying to find a non-chain breakfast joint in Gulf Port that was open.  We ended up way out by the train tracks...


And found this gem of a bakery/authentic vietnamese deli.


The recovery money on the coast post-Katrina has been used in part to put in a few great parks.




Wow.


We walked to the beach a few times, but mostly spent the days lounging at the pool, which we had to ourselves, no matter what time of day, for the entire long weekend.  Not sure what the other guests were up to.





Food is a central part of our vacations, and we hit up fruit stands on the drive south, grocery stores when we got to town, and restaurants in between our constant snacking.


These two are the best of friends, intermittently.





We took evening walks on the beach each night.


The kids having an impromptu dance party on the patio of a restaurant.  


That wasn't enough to get their wiggles out, so we pulled over on the way back to the motel for a beach-run.


We toodled North on a Tuesday morning, stretching the five hour drive into a 9.5 hour quest for soft serve, (unsuccessful, a critical flaw with this state,) and timed our drive up route 7 to cross paths with a storm system that included tornadoes.

10 miles from home we pulled over and spent a little time in a culvert that cuts under route 7, watching the doppler on our cell phones, and dealing with the grumpy kids who had been asleep in the car and didn't go in for this new "adventure".


We made a break for home between two fronts on the doppler, and though the drive was in near white-out walls of rain, we made it home to a collection of scared and wet dogs.  The newly refinished floors were dry and ready to be lived on, but we had left our mattress on the upstairs porch, and the blowing rain had soaked it.  The kids were deposited in their beds, the dogs curled up in the sun room, and Alexe and I had to sleep on the couches.  

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