At the Gulf

We got to spend 2 days and 2 nights camping at Gulf State Park in Gulf Shores, Alabama.  And, you know what?  It was a good time.  Now, it was hot and humid and drizzly and there were bugs (like the ants that made a hole in the floor of one of the tents the 2nd day forcing us to rearrange sleeping assignments and leaving Andy to volunteer to sleep in the car.  Best. Man. Ever.), but we had fun and it was a new experience.  And, because it wasn't too terrible, I could see us camping again.  

The park gave us a list of sites to pick from and we picked the site that was on the corner.  I think this gave us the most space for our tent city.

8 people need 3 tents.  Marcus slept in the green one (which is his).  The girls and I slept in the closest red one and the rest of the boys and Andy slept in the big red one.  We also borrowed a big tarp that the Boy Scouts use for eating under.  That came in very handy keeping our chairs dry in the rain.

After the boys set up camp, we were off the Gulf.  You have to drive to the park beach from the camp grounds, but you get in free to the beach with your camping permit tag.  

Sand. Water. Cale.

In the Gulf.  The water was a little rough and those waves seem to pull you a little bit.  I didn't want to kids getting out to far.

This might have been when Kella got scared by the water.  I came and got her out. And she started to look for little shells.

And, then, Liam got stung by a jellyfish.  Andy saw it swim away after the deed was done.  Oh, it hurt a lot!  Liam was crying and screaming and rubbing his leg.  Where he got stung did swell up and look bad enough that I thought we would have to locate the nearest med-check to take Liam to.  And, people kept coming over making sure Liam was okay.  After about the 4th or 5th person, and, maybe 15 minutes being at the beach, we left, with the promise to Liam to go get some vinegar to put on his leg.  Bought the vinegar and went back to the campgrounds.  Before we went back to our tents, we swung by the campground pool.  We were still in our suits anyway.  We spent the next couple hours swimming in a really nice pool.  Then, back to the campsite for dinner (Andy cooked all our meals), dessert and bedtime.

The next day was drizzly and thunder-y.  We got made our way to the Gulf Pier-also free to go on with our camp permit. The pier goes out into the gulf and lots of people come to fish off it.

We came.  We saw.  We conquered.  

Random bird nest set up at the state park.  

The rest of the time at the state park consisted of swimming at the pool, going to the camp nature center, shopping at the camp store (I got my magnet) and just being together as a family.  Gulf State Park was a really nice campground.  It is clean, it had a great pool (did I already say that) and the bathroom/showers were clean and air-conditioned.  No lie-some random camper was sleeping in the bathroom the 2nd morning when I came to brush my teeth the second morning.  We never did go back to the Gulf to swim.  Honestly,  the water was still too rough for our not-so-strong swimmers.  And, when you have a nice pool to swim in....