After we booked our trip we started looking at maps of the Anaheim area. Once I realized we wouldn't be that far from the beach, I knew we needed to plan to spend a day there and show the kids the ocean for the first time! Sunday morning we had breakfast at the hotel. The nice room and the fabulous breakfast were our favorite parts of the hotel. The breakfast was cook to order. They had pancakes or french toast everyday. The best part was the Mickey Mouse shaped pancakes! Once we finished breakfast we punched in the nearest beach, Huntington into the GPS and away we went. The drive was only about a 1/2 hour or so. Once we got to the Pacific Coast HWY we drove down the beach til we found a parking spot. $6 to park for a few hours. It was extremely busy! People and dogs everywhere. I guess being a Sunday there were tons of people out exercising and walking along the sidewalks. After we parked we ran up to the railing and looked out at the Pacific Ocean. The beach was full of people and dogs and the water had ton of surfers! We didn't realize til after, but Huntington had a specific area for dogs so it was a pretty popular place. We walked up the beach a bit and found a nice spot to spread out some beach towels and spend the morning. We were just off the edge of the designated dog area and it was fun to see the dogs splash and play in the water.
The kids were in heaven. The beach was littered with seashells and they didn't waste any time gathering their treasures. Grandma Kerry has got them excited about shells and the kept talking about her and the shells the whole morning. It was warm, we mostly wore our jackets. The water was cold, but still fun to play and put our feet in. The kids also enjoyed jumping off a sandbar into the sand, just like the sandunes. While we were enjoying a snack, TJ pointed off shore and said "Look, Sharks!" Now that was pretty unexpected, especially since the water was full of surfers. Sure enough, there were some animals in the water with fins, but they were Dolphins, not Sharks thank goodness! What an amazing thing! A whole family of them. We were making a big deal about it all while no one else there seemed to care. Talking to someone afterward, they said that they see the Dolphins their quite often. We counted 5 or 6 of them and loved watching them splash and play in the water. We could see some land in the distance, we confirmed it later that it was Catalina Island. Both Josh and I had been there before, me when I visited as a port of call for a Cruise I took in High School. Josh worked out there for a summer as a scout camp leader so that was a fun connection.
We had plans in the afternoon to drive up the coast to Manhattan Beach where a friend of Josh's lives. Before we left town, we found a Wendy's and ate lunch. We then moseyed our way North.
Once we got to Manhattan Beach, we went straight to the beach. We found some off street parking and ended up walking along the boardwalk down to the pier. It was a long ways! There were two paths, one for pedestrians and one for bikers. It was SO crowded! Like I said before, Californians are active people! Along our walk down we got to people watch and see all the gorgeous homes with the walkway as their backyard. Once we got closer to the pier we walked down to the beach and walked the last bit in the sand. Gage brought the Frisbee and the boys tossed that back as forth. I was anxious to get some under the pier shots so I lugged my camera the long way! It didn't disappoint as the next picture posted from there turned out to be my favorite of the whole trip! We then walked back and up on top of the pier to the building at the end. To our surprise, there was a small (tiny) aquarium there and it had a few fish and stuff for the kids to touch. We made our way back to the car and drove to Josh's friend Sonny's home which was only a few blocks away. We visited a bit with he and his kids then we went to a local Mexican restaurant for dinner. The service was slow, but it was nice because it gave us more of a chance to visit. After dinner we said our goodbyes and drove back another 40 minutes to our hotel. We threw the kids in bed and got to sleep quick because we needed our rest for Disneyland the next day!
