Beach Trip
Posted in General on March 31st, 2005The family headed down to the beach for a one day adventure. We visited Carolina and Kure beaches, as well as visited the Ft. Fisher Aquarium. You can see some online video of the aquarium here.
This was my daughter’s first time to the beach, so it was extra special. She loved the sand and the water (although a bit scared at first). Once we walked in the surf a little, she wanted to play “nana-boo-boo” with the water. I had to pull her away a few times, she wanted to follow the waves into the ocean. Needless, to say I had a “death grip” on her hand or arm at all times.
We really didn’t go down with expectations of getting wet. So, we didn’t even have a towel with us. Although, both my daughter and I got wet due to the waves catching the back of our legs 
My daughter, enjoyed the experience of shopping at the gift shops with her mother. She found a dolphin key chain and necklace that she loves. They both have a button you can press to make them light up; and even better they are PINK!
We tried to make some attempt at castle building, but being that we were not dressed to get close to the “wet” sand; it was a bit difficult to get anything to stay together. We used some pails and a duck shaped container, to have fun never the less. We dug down deep enough, to get some moist sand and that helped a little.
After the beaches, we headed down to the aquarium. They took our picture as we entered, for their “package deal”. They want you to spend $20 for 3-5 pics, we turned them down — but it is a nice idea, especially for those that don’t have cameras. The aquarium didn’t have any dolphins or whales, this was a bit of disappointment for my daughter. But the exhibits they had were wonderful.
We were able to observe, the feeding of the aligators which was quite a show. They had people on both sides of the exhibit with 10-20 ft poles. They put chicken or meat in a vise on the end, and then stick it down in the exhibit area for the alligators to eat.
They had a touch pool with small fish, shells, star fish, and some other creatures. My daughter and wife enjoyed that exhibit.
I think the favorite for all of us, was the two story tank where they had small sharks, manta rays, and other assorted fish. They had a curved class, that you could look through, and almost feel like you were sticking you hand into the water. Really cool.
They also had a jelly fish exhibit, and I was able to take a shot that actually turned out well (look at the photo’s associated with this entry).
As we headed to the gift shop, we found a cool machine that would take 51 cents (two quarters, and a penny); and reshape the penny into oval shaped penny with a aquatic animal (My daughter made a star fish and otter).
The gift my daughter purchased was a little otter. She hasn’t named it yet.
After a day of adventure, we then set out to find somewhere to eat. Of course, we wanted seafood — isn’t that why you go to the beach? Well, it seems this isn’t something that’s easy to find around these beaches. We wanted a comfortable sit-down restaurant. What we found was a fast-food style place, with a dinning area, and up scale place that wanted at least $15 per meal, then we asked the locals. They recommended Rucker-Johns, which turned out to only have 4 seafood choices, and all the all-american meals you wanted, so we explained to the waitress what we wanted — and she directed us to The Blue Crab Grill. Well, this actually took us out of our path that we came through, but after an additional 15-20 minutes (In all we searched for a meal for about an hour) we got to the restaurant. This was another up-scale place, but in a business plaza so it was affordable. My daughter and I got fried shrimp that was good, the wife tried another dish and sent it back — most of the dishes were “fancy”, and evidently didn’t work out for her.
And for desserts, what better than Dunkin Dounuts. They have a Krispy Kreme in town (and at the beach), my wife has a love for DD. So we got some donuts to go, and headed back home!
