Vacation at the Outerbanks

At long last, vacation time finally arrived and the Virginia Fagellas headed south to the Outerbanks of North Carolina for a beautiful week at Duck. Memorial Day week is a great time to go - before the summer crowds, heat, and mosquitos set in.

As always, traveling to the beach for a week requires a lot of stuff and it takes some time to pack the car. Anna was a little anxious to get going and proceeded to climb into her carseat, buckled herself in, put her sunglasses on, and declared that she was ready to go before the packing was completed. After some negotiations, she agreed to get out until Dad finished packing the car. You would not know it from the pictures, but we actually packed less stuff this year as evidenced by the fact that no rope was necessary to secure the contents of the vehicle. After a few high fives on the excellent packing job, we loaded up Anna and her kitty cat pillow, headed south, and spent the first half of the trip discussing

what we may have forgotten (how could we possibly Kite Flying

have packed less).

When we arrived at our destination in Duck, NC, we found our condo to be a bit below the usual standards we have come to expect. Our standards are pretty basic - working lights, blinds that open, batteries in the remote controls.....none of which our temporary housing had. While we were initially annoyed and made a few phone calls for repairs, our annoyance turned to appreciation after we saw the place that Wil, Pauletta, and Jon Christian, who were spending the weekend at the beach, had (who knew a "full kitchen" meant a dorm refrigerator and two burner hot plate). Check out Pauletta's blog to read about their adventures at the Outerbanks.

Wil, Pauletta, and Jon Christian building a sand fortress, complete with soldiers.

Memorial Day was truly memorable for the guys as Joe, Wil, and Jon Christian departed at 5:30 AM for a fishing trip. After nearly 8 years together, Theresa had become use to Joe's fishing plans only for him to return with stories of a relaxing trip but no fish. Perhaps the charter boat would change all of that. Pauletta, Theresa, and Anna headed to the beach while the men were fishing and planned a memorial day BBQ with fresh fish. At about 12:00, the first call came in from the fisherman to report their impending return and to ask if we needed anything from the store because they were picking up burgers for dinner. No fish......although Joe claims he was "high hook." Theresa and Anna believe this means his hook was too high, thus no fish could get on it. Wil, Pauletta, and Jon Christian returned to Northern Virginia on Tuesday after Wil and Jon Christian finished introducing Anna to Sponge Bob Squarepants..

Fishing with Dad

The rest of the week was filled with sunny days and lots of relaxation. Anna learned to fly her kite and Dad built sandcastles. Mom was emersed in her books about wives of the Founding Fathers. This means that the rest of the family (aka Joe and Anna) were subjected to historical factoids all week about the adventures of Abigal Adams, Martha Washington, Louisa Adams, etc...

While Mom was reliving the American revolution, the big highlight for Anna was the Disney Princess fishing pole that her Dad bought her. Joe decided to pass on his fishing skills to his daughter. Fortunately, Anna has her father's appreciation for casting and reeling without getting any fish and proceeded to cast and reel for two hours the first day and another hour and a half the second day. Anna also found it necessary to stand right next to her Dad the entire time, which was a challenge for Joe when he was trying to fish himself. Mom read a book. The big catch was not a fish but a crab, which Joe reeled in only to have Anna scream and run to her Mom. At the end of the fishing trip, we stopped at the local seafood market for some fresh fish for dinner.

We try to do something new each time we visit the Outerbanks. This time, at the suggestion of Pauletta and Wil, we finally visited the Wright Brothers national memorial. After a hike to the top of the sand dune, we had a beautiful view of the ocean and sound.

Wright Brothers National Memorial

Sadly, we left the sun and sand behind to return home. Our trips to and from the beach usually involve a lunch stop at a local park or Civil War battlefield. If you ever travel through Virginia, you will find there are Civil War battlefields everywhere. On this trip, we stopped at the Cold Harbor battlefield outside of Richmond.

Anna reading the map at Cold Harbor Battlefield

It was a great trip with some much needed relaxation. We can't wait to go back again!