The Winter Beach

While there are obvious benefits to going to the beach in the summer (warm weather, splashing in the water, soaking up the sun) I happen to be one of those people who will pretty much take any opportunity presented to spend a day by the ocean. So when Joe announced he had to make a day trip to Pendleton last Thursday, I jumped at the chance for the kids and I to tag along.

Save for the almost 3 hour drive down there, I could not have been more happy that we decided to go. There is something so revitalizing about the beach - the cool breeze, the sound of waves crashing on the shore, the smell of the salty water and sandy shores. And the benefit of going to a private military beach on a winter day is that we pretty much had the entire beach all to ourselves. The kids and I walked out the rock jetties, searched for seashells, attempted to build a sandcastle and horsed around on the playground that is situated RIGHT on the beach. It was pretty much the perfect way to spend an early afternoon.

We then got to see a taste of what Daddy does when he is at work, getting a grand tour of one of the Command Operational Centers that he trains and troubleshoots the Marines on which, by the way, was pretty interesting. On the way home we grabbed lunch at In-N-Out and made some shopping stops to start on the kids spring/summer wardrobes, finishing off the evening with our favorite pizzas from Round Table. It was an impromptu, fun-filled and exhausting day.

Every time we go to the Pendleton area (north San Diego County for those not familiar) I long to be able to move back down there. I think of how little I really seized the opportunity of being within walking distance of the beach for 3 years. Of course then I had a almost full-time job in addition to trying to finish my Bachelor's degree and coordinating the Key Volunteers for Joe's unit from 9/11 through their deployment during the initial Operation Iraqi Freedom. Needless to say I was busy and had a lot on my mind. But I often daydream of what it would be like now, to be able to take the kids to the beach on a whim and all the fun family oriented activities their are in the area. Of course I forget the fact that when we lived there, I was always cold, missing the true heat of a summer inland and dreading the almost constant cloud cover that accompanies living so close to the shore. More importantly, the cost of living and traffic in that area is beyond ridiculous.

So I guess we kind of have the best of both worlds. We live somewhere that is affordable and has very little traffic and I more than have my wish of warm summers (115 degrees can be a little excessive, LOL!). But when we want to get away we can. We are within a 2 hour drive of most of our family and in the same time frame can be playing in the snow of the mountains or running along the sandy shores of the beach. We can take the boat out to the river or go to various amusement parks and zoos. I just hope that when I look back at this time, I will have no regrets and feel that I seized every opportunity to do fun and exciting things, sharing them with my husband and kids.