Vacation: Day 4 (a.m.)

Jeff decided to take his recumbent bike down to the beach this year. We had talked about taking mine, as well, but either we didnt have enough room or Jeff decided I could rent one... I dont remember which. Point is, he had a bike and I didnt. Which, secretly, I think is how he wanted it ;-) He set his alarm for 5:30 or 6am a few mornings and headed out for a ride, solo. I got pretty annoyed by being woke up by his alarm, but it also gave me the chance to enjoy the sunrise! I'm not much of a morning person, so that was pretty cool!

On this particular day, we decided to take a break from the daily routine of heading to the beach and instead decided to head out on a tour of cumberland Island! It would be a boat ride so we figured the kids would enjoy it, and we could bring snacks. Sounded like a win-win!

When we arrived, i snapped this pic of this egret. It was crazy how LOW the tide was in the morning compared to at night. Literally, about an 8-9 foot difference!

The trip started out with our gude talking about Shrimping. Yes, our minds both went to bubba gump! The guide talked about how shrimpers have almost all been put out of business by the "shrimp farms" and that the "fresh" shrimp we eat at restaurants is farm raised. AKA: pumped full of steroids. He said that what takes literally a few weeks to grow on a shrimp farm takes 4-6 months in the ocean. And how the only way to make sure you're getting true fresh shrimp from the ocean (without hormones) is to order off the menu when it lists the shrimp as WILD. That ordering wild shrimp, when available, also supports the local economy!

I dont even remember all of the explanations for everything. I just took a lot of pictures! By this point into the tour (maybe 20 minutes) the kids were already restless. Oh my. It was a 1 hour tour!

I took a pic of this netting (on the boat) becuase this company is actually based in amelia island and is one of the largest hand crafted netting companies! They make a lot of the professional soccer nets among other things, like netting for boats, shrimpers, etc. And its all hand crafted! Again, awesome for the local economy!

On our tour, we saw this guy catch a SHARK! Someone on our boat yelled out for him to not be a wimp and to pick it up so we could see it (haha... said in gest, no doubt!)... but the guy DID IT! How cool!

There it is... Cumberland Island!

This is actually Fort Clinch which we went and toured last year! You can check that post out here.

It was pretty cool to see the fort from the outside looking in this year! I think it even kept the kids attentions for about half a second!

One of the biggest reasons we thought the kids would enjoy the tour was because we had heard that we would see 1. Dolphins and 2. Wild horses. Well, we did see both. And they probably could have, too, if we would have had binoculars! They were SO far away!

Keep in mind that ALL of these pics taken were done so with my zoom lens...

There was some cool story behind this house that you can see peeking through the trees, but I dont remember it now. Seriously, i was trying to listen and trying to keep the kids occupied. Rhyan, btw, had decided she didnt like ANY of the snacks I had brought and was pouting at this point. Nice. I cant remember the tour info, but I can tell you how fussy the kids were ;-)

On our way back, Mack was SO sleepy/tired. Our 1 hour trip had turned into just over 1.5 hours. Great "free" tour time if you're soaking it all in. But for us, we were ready to be DONE!

 I'm sure the others around us were ready for us to get off, also. But as patrons sitting at the front of the boat (uncovered, btw... no shade), the tour guide had put us in charge of keeping an eye out for dolphins and alerting the captian if we saw one. Well, Jeff saw one. And he was hoping no one else would b/c he did NOT want to slow down to look at it. I'm telling you, we were done. ;-) But I told him that wasnt fair to the others. So, reluctantly, he told the captain. And we got a pic of these little guys.

When we got back, it was almost 1pm. The kids were hungry (remember, Rhyan had boycotted my undesirable snacks) so we decided to go through the DQ drive through and eat on the way back to the condo for naps. Rhyan ALSO decided DQ was unacceptable and literally cried b/c she wanted "old mcdonalds"

It was a great morning, folks. haha! Lets just say that with kids, sometimes you win, and sometimes you're miserable! LOL!

We ate the lunch and thanked God for naptimes. Evening post to come! This day was TOO busy for one post!