A Topsail Of The Morning

Excited To Be In Topsail

6:40 AM

Our House

The light started peaking through our blinds around 5:30, so I got up at 5:45, to a partly cloudy sky.  I will miss the sunrise here because we are facing southeast and the sun rises to the northeast, at least I was not able to get a glimpse of the sun until around 6:20.  Anyways, I was the only one up, so I made coffee and went out on one of our three decks to enjoy the morning, but the wifi wouldn't work outside, so I decided to just go down to the beach, with a lawn chair, and enjoy the morning with my coffee, the only one on the beach at 6:00, at least as far as I could see.  Its now 6:52 and Drew and Evie are up, out on the highest balcony, just off our bedrooms.  I am sitting in our living room, looking out at the breakers through the wind/water blasted windows; it's like looking at the sky through blurred glasses.

Granny And An Excited Marisa

Breakfast At Hampton Inn

Yesterday began with breakfast at the Hampton.  By 9:00, the Albarrans were over and we went off to Topsail by 10:00.  It was a two and a half hour drive, pleasant enough, some traffic but not overwhelming.  We were going to get to Topsail via Surf City but Jill called to say it was swarming with traffic so we drove north another ten miles and entered to the north of our house, via Rt. 210 and Sneads Ferry, an easy go with no traffic, over a steep bridge, with what almost looked like rice patties on both sides, like the kind I imagine in Vietnam, like small islands, with a few kayakers meandering through.

Crossing Bridge at Sneads Ferry

 We were able to leave to talk to the cleaner who said we could get in at 2:00, so we drove to a local bar/restaurant, Rick's Restaurant and Sports Bar, just down the road, and had a good lunch of appetizers with beer.  The place was packed so I assume many of the other patrons were like us, waiting to get in their house.

Waiting To Get In Our House At Rick's Sports Bar

We were in by 2:00 but it took us awhile to get everything inside despite the fact that we had an elevator...classy.  The girls loved it of course.  Once we got the food and bags in, we all went down to the beach, warm and humid, with a fairly strong wind.  It was low tide so there were great tides pools, some a couple of feet deep, for the kids to play in.  I went right into the ocean, had to taste that saltwater, went only as far as my waist, and tried some body surfing but the waves were choppy. Most of the adults went in, like me, tentatively and up to their waist keeping an eye out for any movement in the waves.  Mitch and Nick had immediately driven off to get a couple of skim boards, so by the end of the afternoon, they were pretty good.  We hung out on the beach until around 6:00, mostly laying in the tide pools with the kids, or walking the beach, jumping in the water occasionally to cool off.  Finally, we got tired of the wind and went in and cleaned up for dinner.

Marisa

Hayden and Halle

Marisa and Marlena

With The Old Surfer Dude

Nick and Mitch With Their Skim Boards

The guys cooked burgers and dogs  outside on the grill and the girls 'heated up the beans.'  So we had an easy dinner, burgers and dogs with the fixings. Some of us took a short walk a dusk, at high tide, with the beach practically gone, the wind still strong. We then played games inside for the rest of the night and missed most of the fireworks at Surf City.  No one seemed to mind because we were happy inside, playing poker or Bananagrams, the girls popping in and out of the hot tub.  We all went up to bed early, around 10:30, tired from our drives and the beach.

Hanging In Their Bedroom

Hot Tubbing

Tommy

Our Grandson, Tyler, In From Dartmouth For the Weekend

Today's weather looks mixed, some sun and perhaps some rain.  We are used to it.