The Beaches on the Southern Most Part of North Carolina

Sunset Beach is just North of Myrtle Beach South Carolina.  In fact we drove to Myrtle Beach a couple times while we were staying at Sunset Beach -- not for the Beach but for the shops.  We tried several different beaches -- all of them were perfect for families with young children.  None of them were overly crowded.   These first photos are Sunset Beach, closest to where we were staying.  Our first day out we got a bit too much sun.    But we were excited about our beach tent.   And Dan had gotten the children new towels and boogie boards.

There is a board walk entrance to most all the beaches.  And our first beach trip we stayed close to the fishing dock.   Helped us keep track of the children when the waves would sweep them further away from us on shore. 

Ken and Dan mostly just chilled out. 

Those boogie boards were a challenge with the wind blowing all the time.  But it felt good and soft and cool.

I'll have to connect you to Sommer's blog to find out how she feels about the ocean.   http://aspicyperspective.com/2011/07/jamaican-johnny-cakes.html

Not a water photo, but our first evening out we visited what Dan called "one of the few reported"good" local restaurants."  We ate out on the deck at the Twin Lakes Seafood Resort.   The sun was bright.  The food was good.

This is our second trip to the beach -- a different spot on Sunset. We waited a few days because of the sunburn.   You can see that this time Dan kept his shirt on.  He got the worse burn of any of us.  Papa, a little too much sun on the head and me, on the feet.

All of the beach photos were taken with the little Fuji FinePix.  We did not want to get sand in the Cannon -- and believe me, THERE WAS SAND IN EVERYTHING! 

My memory may be getting a little fuzzy now.  But I believe this is the same evening and we have cover-ups on ready to leave the beach.  This one is still Sunset Beach but a different area and the boardwalk was very long over the marshland to reach the ocean.

First up out of the sand. 

And then the walk across the marshlands.   Pretty cool place.

Now this is  later in the week.    We were going to eat out at the "second reportedly good restaurant,"  the Jamaican Sugar Shack.  But when we got there, there was more than an hour wait.    So we got the kids buckets and went looking for sea shells.  We had heard that shells were plentiful on this Ocean Isle Beach.

Once again, off across the boardwalk.

And indeed, there were many shells here. 

The Carolina Grasses are beautiful against the white sand and blue ocean. 

So now, we are heading back to see if we can be seated at the Sugar Shack.

Still not ready, but the wait was worth it.  Notice Dan's favorite pose--a growth on his ear. 

Beans and rice, yams, johnny cakes, ribs, seafood and all the works, here we come. 

I'll close this out with some water fun by the pool.

And there is one more blog posting about Bald Head Island. Keep reading.