I mentioned in my post yesterday that it was 7/10ths of a mile from the main campsite area at Topsail Hill Preserve State Park to the beach. There was a tram that ran every hour, but it didn't start running until 9:00am and the last tram back from the beach was around 7:00pm. I don't know if you have noticed, but my kiddos are pretty pale, and any exposure to the blistering (albeit beautiful) Florida sun between the hours of 9:00am to 6:00pm was out of the question.
We walked the first evening that we arrived down to the beach. We were excited and the kids were excited. We'd been cooped up in the car all day long, and it was a welcome relief to get out and walk. We caught the last tram back from the beach to the campsite, and felt as though it wouldn't be a problem to walk each day in the early morning and evening. The following day the walk to the beach went well. After an hour or so of playing we headed back on foot. Dirck and I had to carry the kiddos (along with the cooler, the umbrella, the beach towels, the shovels, pales and buckets, and the beach bag) part of the way back because they were starting to fall apart after playing all morning in the ocean. That evening we were hopeful that the kids would rally, and again, they did great on the walk down to the beach, but once again, after playing hard in the ocean, the walk back was disastrous. It was hot. I was carrying a huge oversized beach bag full of stuff, and an umbrella, and for a good 3/4ths of that walk, I had either a 30 lb kid or a 40 lb kid on my other hip. I really though my back was going to give. Something had to be done.
After a little research, we found out that you could rent bikes from the campground. Not only could you rent bikes, but you could rent little trailers to pull behind the bikes. This sounded perfect. We'd seen other families with bikes and many had those little double stroller looking pull behinds, so really, this sounded ideal. When we went to rent our bikes, the only trailer they had for the bikes were these plastic bread-tray looking trailers. You know, the bread trays that the grocery stores stack on top of each other? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. It was the type of trailer that was supposed to be for carrying stuff, not munchkins. We weren't sure this was going to work, but felt it was our only option, so we picked our bikes, hitched the trailer, and drove them back to the cabin.
Turns out, not only can that little trailer hold two little kiddos, but can hold a small cooler as well! I know we were quite a site pedaling to the beach each morning and each evening, but it couldn't have worked better for us, and the kiddos . . . they loved it! After some stern warnings and several safety talks they seemed to understand that they had to be careful.
So there's our Redneck Transportation System.
We walked the first evening that we arrived down to the beach. We were excited and the kids were excited. We'd been cooped up in the car all day long, and it was a welcome relief to get out and walk. We caught the last tram back from the beach to the campsite, and felt as though it wouldn't be a problem to walk each day in the early morning and evening. The following day the walk to the beach went well. After an hour or so of playing we headed back on foot. Dirck and I had to carry the kiddos (along with the cooler, the umbrella, the beach towels, the shovels, pales and buckets, and the beach bag) part of the way back because they were starting to fall apart after playing all morning in the ocean. That evening we were hopeful that the kids would rally, and again, they did great on the walk down to the beach, but once again, after playing hard in the ocean, the walk back was disastrous. It was hot. I was carrying a huge oversized beach bag full of stuff, and an umbrella, and for a good 3/4ths of that walk, I had either a 30 lb kid or a 40 lb kid on my other hip. I really though my back was going to give. Something had to be done.
After a little research, we found out that you could rent bikes from the campground. Not only could you rent bikes, but you could rent little trailers to pull behind the bikes. This sounded perfect. We'd seen other families with bikes and many had those little double stroller looking pull behinds, so really, this sounded ideal. When we went to rent our bikes, the only trailer they had for the bikes were these plastic bread-tray looking trailers. You know, the bread trays that the grocery stores stack on top of each other? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. It was the type of trailer that was supposed to be for carrying stuff, not munchkins. We weren't sure this was going to work, but felt it was our only option, so we picked our bikes, hitched the trailer, and drove them back to the cabin.
Turns out, not only can that little trailer hold two little kiddos, but can hold a small cooler as well! I know we were quite a site pedaling to the beach each morning and each evening, but it couldn't have worked better for us, and the kiddos . . . they loved it! After some stern warnings and several safety talks they seemed to understand that they had to be careful.
So there's our Redneck Transportation System.
Yay for Redneck ingenuity!
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