Vacation

 I'd better make a post about our vacation before I forget. 

We've been busy buying a house (and the more time consuming endeavor, selling a house). Post on that to come (probably). 

So! We took what turned out to be a very poorly-timed vacation, but maybe a needed one, and we had a lovely time. As an added bonus, we got to stay with my Grandma Doris in the bootheel on the way down and on the way home from Ocean Springs, Mississippi, which is on the Gulf Coast. We stayed at the same VBRO that we'd stayed at 5 years ago. Here's a link to the last post I made about that trip back in 2016 (pre-Leah!) and you can just keep clicking through to the next "older post" to see them all. Link!

Here's Leah with her beloved stuffed elephant Trumpo on the long drive down. 

Sam carefully planned out all of our stops so that we could eat at rest areas or restaurants outside and at not-regular-mealtimes, but the planned burger place with a patio was packed, so we bought a package of drumstick ice cream treats at a grocery store and ate them here. We were varying degrees of good sports about it. 

The house where we stayed has some groovy 70's architecture. 

Leah was more enthusiastic about the last-day photo than the bigs. 

The kids took full advantage of the Jacuzzi tub. "This is LUXURIOUS," James declared. 

Sam took quite a lot of nature photography (& video): 

One of the kids must have taken this for us: 

Leah's wearing the same swimsuit that Amelie wore the last time we came to the beach! 

This was at a national seashore (just like a national park, but on the ocean, I think) - but the visitor's center was closed, so we just walked around a bit and took these pictures: 

We even took the same shrimp boat tour as 5 years ago. The same tour guide told the same jokes. He coaxed the kids into holding all the different fish that came up in the tri-line. This one is a cutlass fish, also called a ribbon fish.  It was the first one and the kids were a little hesitant at first. 

They warmed up to it! 

I forget which fish this is - but it's the flat kind who have an eye that migrates over to one side, so that both eyes are on the same side. Maybe a flounder. 

And there's a shrimp! 

And a whole handful of shrimps!

We didn't see any dolphins this trip, but the seagulls swarmed the boat and carried off all the fish we threw overboard: 

I talked everyone into going to the sandhill crane refuge. The visitor's center was closed and no one else was there, but we walked around the trail. The landscape was pretty different even though it was very close to where we were staying. 

We saw these pitcher plants - a carnivorous plant that digests insects that fall into the trap. 

You can see that we had the beach to ourselves! If you zoom in, my kids are making socially-distant sand castles along this stretch. 

Sam enjoyed the waves.

I like the way the seagulls each claim a post to sit up on. 

The kids wanted to go to the exact same stretch of beach every single time. 

Our first day there, we did an eco tour with a guide on a motorboat up the Pascagoula River. 

James and I got sunburnt our first day & Leah didn't want to stay in her seat. 

We have some Cyprus trees in MO, too. 

We also saw hanging Spanish moss, saw palmettos, a houseboat that had been beached in the hurricane, a working hunting houseboat, several blue herons and white egrets. The guide saw a Mylar balloon and asked us if it was okay if she went back to retrieve the litter (of course!) I love the lily pads: 

Wild rice: 

Another view of the bridge - it was cool to speed along under it. 

I think the kids tried out three different parks with splash pads. James was a good citizen at this one and cleared the drain of rocks and shells and sticks. 

The kids in Ocean Springs were already back in school the week we were there, so we had all the parks to ourselves, too. 

Eating seaside at a restaurant! We all tried fried alligator and James and Leah had fried shrimp. We did a fair amount of carry-out as well. I ate seafood every single day we were there! I think Amelie sampled every chicken strip in the state of Mississippi.  

The Mississippi Aquarium was a little pricy (parking, too), but very nice to essentially have it all to ourselves as well! I think during normal times folks might be packed in like sardines, but here are James and Leah with the whole tide pool/interactive area. 

We went through twice. 

James

Amelie

Leah

They were playing classical music where you could look at this giant glass wall & see all the ocean life. They've got an injured/rehabilitated sea turtle & we got to see the scuba divers go down into the tank and feed the sharks. 

There was a small aviary at the aquarium as well. 

Leah likes birds. It was quite hot. 

There were stations where the kids could stamp a card as they saw different animals/exhibits. Here's Amelie with her completed card. There was some disagreement among the children about if they should stamp the cards when they saw the stamping stations or when they saw the animals. (James wanted to hold out until he'd actually seen the alligator.) 

Back at the beach. James liked burying himself in sand. 

Just raking the ocean, as one does. 

We didn't go inside, but we were impressed with the giant guitar outside the Hard Rock Casino in Biloxi. 

Sam got up early one morning and walked halfway across the pedestrian bridge to Biloxi.