Duck Beach Recap

Wow! A full week spent at the beach with a lot of great friends, some new friends, and of course Maya. Here are a few highlights and a bunch of pictures. I only kept about 675 pictures so you may want to pace yourself! Sorry it has taken so long to finally post something from the beach trip.I am actually still on vacation (Utah right now), and just had been otherwise distracted away from posting. I was able to catch my breath a bit today so here is the synopsis. Friday Vacation started with a very late night and a very early morning. Dan convinced that going the midnight showing of X-Men 3 was a great idea. Then I had to finish packing and try to get some sleep before a 3:30AM start to a very long day. I think I managed to get about 45 minutes! Saturday Packed the car (I kept trying to justify the fact the car was FULL to fact that I am packing to two of us for an entire week at the beach!) and headed to BWI to pick up Maya at 5AM.Emily helped us to car to kill time before she headed right back to Utah on a return flight.When we pulled into Rachel’s drive at about 7:30AM, Maya said she needed to go to the bathroom.Then she quickly repeated it with much more urgency.I quickly came around the car but struggled to unlatch the seatbelt.She suddenly got sick all over her blankets and dress and the car!We took to stuff inside at through it into the washer for a quick wash – there was NO WAY we were going to attempt any drive without the blankies.We managed to make it to the Outer Banks, NC in about 5 hours with three stops and no more issues. We stopped by the rental office to get the keys but ended up waiting almost an hour before they would release them to us.By the time we got there with the keys, Tara had already managed to ‘break-in’, posted all of the room assignments, and left for lunch. The first order of business for Maya was the pool.And thus began the vacation consisting mostly of pool, beach, hot tub, and food.My objective for the week to make sure we did not get sunburned and to attempt to stay on a pretty good sleep schedule.Both of which I think we accomplished pretty well. We met all of the house-mates throughout the evening and Dan headed up the creation of a big steak feast. Sunday This was the first full day on the beach and the most pictures taken of any of the days (over 400).Most of the pictures are sequence shots of Jeremy and Patrick boogie boarding. Monday-Wednesday These days blend together but they involved lots of beach time, pool time, hot tub time, and food.On Wednesday morning we walked along the beach in search of the wild horses.We didn’t see any sign of the horses but we did have a nice walk. By Wednesday night, Maya and I were the only two people left in our house and Erin’s house was down to 5 people (Erin, Stephanie, Rae, Lynnette, and Jim). Thursday More beach and pool time with Stephanie, Rae and Erin.Maya helped Stephanie make jars of sand, shells and water to remember the beach. Friday We went to breakfast with Steph and Rae then they headed home. We played at Erin’s house going up and down two flights of stairs as Maya lead us back and forth between the hot tub and the pool.We tried to take a nap on the hammock but Maya just was not able to relax!It was the final relaxing evening watching a movie with Erin and I did not want the vacation to end. Saturday Packed up all the stuff and did the final walk-through of the house. Then we helped Erin and Lynnette clean up their house too. It was raining as we drove home which made our departure a bit less depressing.Just before we got to King’s Dominion the rain had stopped so we decided to go for it!I’ll post that next. Thanks to everyone who was in our house (Tara, Georgina, Scott (Falls Church), Scott (Reston), Anne, Rachel, Deborah, Lori, Nichole, Nate, Martha, Shelley, Jill, Kristen, Ben, Jayson, Rick, Jen, Dan, and Amber – and Corey and Maya).And thanks to cool peeps who were in Erin’s house too (Erin, Stephanie, Rae, Karl, and Gwen)We had a really cool group of people and I think we had one of the most relaxed houses of the weekend. Everyone was able to go to the parties they wanted to then return home and chill.Tara and I had that goal in mind from the beginning and think we succeeded pretty well.Luckily Tara is amazingly connected with great friends who have great friends. Thanks fellow beach lovers. Anyone want to sign up for next year? Here is my Duck Beach gallery of the 675 pictures that I kept! Here is Tara’s compilation gallery from several people (including me).