picture explosion -vacation 2017

Lots of pics and words coming to the blog.  We returned from vacation two days ago.  

Vacation starts with the planning and scheduling.  Stop the mail. Arrange a kennel stay for the dogs. Pack.  This year we actually dropped the dogs off the day we left which meant a later start time for the drive.  We were caravanning with my friend Kim who was staying nearby, so it helped her out to have a later start for a long drive.

This first post is about our road trip traditions.

We always play "Sweet Home Alabama" when we head South.
We usually play "Vacation" by the Go-Gos, "Holiday Road" from National Lampoon's Vacation, and we often throw in "I'm Diving In" by Steven Curtis Chapman.

I had to laugh when we found this quaint town on the drive.  Andy noted that they had a patriotic looking building but that the town itself looked over the hill."  That was the first of our memorable vacation quotes.

first palm tree spotted

If only our travels took us to the Welcome Center where photo ops were an option.

Road trippin'

the bay

He drove the whole way!!

Trying to get our toes in the sand for the first time - turns out this is not our access point - oops

Finally!

That sand is powder soft!

Some of our first looks --more to come.

Our computer is old and slow, so it literally took hours to load all the pictures.  Blog posts are scheduled to post daily approximately 24 hours apart until August 10th.  Rather than a day by day description of vacation, this one will be daily themes.