Our Summer Vacation - Trip to Florida

On June 19th, we loaded up the car with a week's worth of clothes, beach supplies and wedding outfits; put the dogs in the backseat and hopped in for a long drive south.

Dog is our co-pilot? 

When my brother announced his engagement to his girlfriend in March, he also mentioned they would be getting married in June.  Dan and I had to scramble to figure out how we were going to add the cost of traveling to my brother's wedding while we were budgeting and planning for our own.  We have travel, dogs and accommodations to think of.  Let's just say the word stress comes to mind when planning for this trip.  We ended up deciding to make a vacation out of it.  Dan's parents recently moved to Pensacola Beach, Florida, which we found out was just 3 and a half hours from New Orleans.  Score!  Free vacation accommodations!

Where we are headed:

So, we decided we would take the whole family (us two and the dogs) and drive.  Then my brother and Michelle (his now wife) came through and offered us a hotel room for two nights in New Orleans (double score!)  Ok.  Still have to worry about 'play' and food money while we're gone but otherwise, we were set!

It took us 12.5 hours to get from Knightdale to Pensacola Beach, Florida with pit stops only for gas, food and rest stops for the dogs (and Dan.)  :)  I am now known, by my fiance, as camel-bladder. .

Pensacola Beach is an absolutely amazing beach.

We spent 5 days relaxing on the sand, in the surf, on jet skis and eating lots of amazing seafood!!

Mmmmmmmmmmmm....raw oysters!!

We saw this one hot humid afternoon from Dan's parents back deck.  Nice view, huh?

The dogs enjoying the sun on the back deck.

Our lovely deserted beach.  View from our parking spot.  

Doesn't get much better than that.

(I'm not allowed to wear a bathing suit with straps till after the wedding...)  :D

Just so everyone knows, yes, there is now oil on Pensacola Beach.  It washed up the Wednesday morning that we were there.  The next morning it was gone.  Well, actually, it wasn't truly 'gone.'  It had been covered up by the high tide the night before.  Dig down 1" and there it was.  Very,  very sad.  We saw lots of workers, though...so that's the good news of it all, I guess.


Next up...The Blue Angels and our trip to New Orleans for Drew's wedding!!