Beach Vaca

I am in love with the North Carolina beaches. We spent an entire week on beautiful Emerald Isle, part of the Crystal Coast (even the names are fabulous!) and the southernmost portion of the Outer Banks. It was amazing. The sand is soft and light, the water warm and inviting. You actually want to get in and swim and you don't freeze! And the waves are the perfect size for our family.

 Ty really loved using the boogie board. He surfed on it, rode on it, and played in the sand with it. 

Halley loved the board as well. She would stand on it, jump on it while yelling "Whoa!" and then laugh.

We took a ferry to Shackleford Island off the coast from Beaufort. It is nine miles long and home to the wild horses and tons of shells. Ty spent the whole two hours we were on the island looking for shells, shells, and more shells. He came home from the trip with 132 shells. That is after we made him get rid of about two-thirds of the ones he had collected.

Besides spending ample time at the beach we did lots of other stuff. Go-carts, bumper boats, the aquarium, visiting a Civil War fort, and touring downtown Beaufort, one of North Carolina's oldest town.

Fort Macon overlooking the bay. The fort is built into the ground so you cannot see it from the road. 

While Brad worked the kids and I visited the NC Aquarium in Atlantic Beach. The photo above is overlooking Bogue Sound. Ty's favorite part was petting the sting rays. 

The outside of the NC Maritime Museum in Beaufort. It had lots of pirate artifacts from Blackbeard's days of  treachery along the NC coast.