Impromptu Beach Trip

On Monday, my family dragged me along with them to the beach.

If you're wondering why I sound so grumpy about the whole thing, imagine sitting in a 10+ year old car with sticky ketchup stains on the seats and a morose little sister worrying about getting sunburnt and parents who will absolutely not stop complaining about all the tiny little things from the angle of my one's knees whilst sitting in the car to the volume of my the earbuds that are a sign a greed because I'm using them is depriving them of music that none of the other occupants of the car want to listen to anyway, all the while angrily criticizing my certain choices of college applications or lack of initiative in my life in general.

Not very pleasant.

Once we arrived at our destination (spoiler alert: not the beach!) I squinted out at the cold, grey dock and swore to myself that I would never agree to go on a family trip again. Of course, I had made this exact same promise after the Alaska trip, the Yosemite trip, and countless others, and all those had been broken because I was curious and wondered if there was a chance that perhaps the next time would be different, only to be met by disappointment again and again.

While my dad was "fishing," my little sister and I ate a quick lunch (ham, cheese, and avocado sandwiches) that was actually quite good. Fortunately, after about five minutes, my dad gave up and we decided to actually go to the beach. After some more squabbling about a little bit of everything, we finally arrived, couldn't find parking, scraped (although very slightly) another car, and just decided to go with it, because everyone was tired and cranky. We parked a little further up the road and climbed down the small, rocky cliff path.

Still, once we hit the beach, it was rather nice. The weather was warm, with a slight breeze, and the beach was clean.

While my parents set up their umbrella and towels to nap, my little sister and I went walking along the shore. We met and were allowed to hold a tiny Chihuahua puppy (named "Vicious"), picked up mussel shells, and briefly explored a sea cave on the southern edge of the beach.



Somehow, back at the umbrella, my little sister started burying herself in the sand and I helped sculpt it into a (very fat) mermaid's tail. After she wriggled out of it, I made it into a shark, and we all had a good laugh.

Later, after walking back from the north end of the beach, I found a ladybug, so I set it down on a flower at the foot of the cliff. I also rescued a large blue dragonfly, inexplicably lying in the wet sand. I scooped it up with a large mussel shell that I had found earlier, and took it back to the umbrella to clean off. While it dried on top of the umbrella, it made feeble attempts at flying, so I planned to take it home to get the rest of the sand off of its wings. However, right as we were cleaning up to leave, it flew away, and was promptly blown right back into the ocean. Ahh, life.

The drive back was quiet, ending the entire trip on a good note. But all good things come at a price, and at home the signs of a bad sunburn developed on my neck and legs. Luckily, as a swimmer, I was prepared for sunburns, and the aloe plants in my backyard finally came into use for the first time this year. I woke up the next morning with no trace of redness anywhere. And thus, the entire ordeal was concluded in a satisfactory manner :)

Obligatory selfie:

Have a great summer everyone! ∆