Vacation Update

Since tomorrow is the first day of school, I figured that I might as well do our vacation post.

This year we kept it close to home and drove down to Williamsburg, VA and then Virginia Beach.  We left on a Saturday morning and got in to Williamsburg in the late afternoon.  We spent some time settling in and went to the pool.  Nothing too crazy for a travel day.

Erik got us a package deal on admission tickets to Colonial Williamsburg, Busch Gardens, and Water Country USA.  It worked out pretty well for us.  We were able to spend good, solid days in all three places, even though we seemed to have been there on the hottest and most humid days of the summer.  That was the only bummer to vacation.

Sunday we decided to spend the day at Water Country.  We had Jacob in swimming lessons this summer and were constantly telling him that he needed to learn to do some swimming things so that he could ride water slides and jump in the pool on vacation.  And how he loved the water slides at Water Country.  The only ones he didn't really like were the slides that were closed off and dark inside.  He also thoroughly enjoyed the wave pool, the lazy river (which wasn't so lazy...) and the various splash pools.  We stayed a good deal later than we thought we would because he was having such a good time.  And he promptly fell asleep in the car as we pulled out of the parking lot.  Success.

We haven't seen his feet this wrinkled since the day he was born...

Yes, he knows this is NOT the correct way to wear a life-jacket...

On Monday, we decided to go to Busch Gardens.  Jacob has been loving the rides at the carnivals we've been to, so we figured that he'd enjoy the rides in an amusement park.  We weren't incorrect in that assumption.  He was a little weary of riding rides by himself, but he got used to that, and by the end of the day, he didn't want to leave.  He especially seemed to enjoy the bumper cars and the Grover roller coaster in the Sesame Street portion of the park (he rode that 5 times).  It was a disgustingly hot and humid day.  We left the park soaking wet.  But it was a pretty awesome day either way.

First ride of the day -- 3 times in a row!

One of the rides in the Sesame Street themed portion of the park.

Prince Elmo's Spire, which is one of those "drop" rides...

Bumper cars -- rode these 4 times in a row!

Tuesday was our last "full" day in the Williamsburg area, so we decided to spend the day at Colonial Williamsburg.  We had walked around the town earlier in our vacation stay, but this time we took time to go into some of the working buildings.  Jacob was a bit of a grouch.  He wasn't into going through the buildings, so we had to deal with some tantrums throughout the day.

Jacob showing me around the gardens at the Governor's Palace

The Governor's Palace -- Patrick Henry lived here for a while

The House of Burgesses -- Where Henry delivered his Speech to the Virginia Convention

Wandering through town

Trying on some hats

Wednesday was a travel day to Virginia Beach for us.  It's not a long drive to the beach, so we arrived a little after lunch.  We spent that afternoon, a good portion of Thursday, and some of Friday at the beach.  Jacob was all about building "sandcastles" (shaping sand and then crushing it), getting buried in the sand, and jumping in the waves.  The little guys loves the beach!

So while this wasn't the big travel vacation that we've been doing the past few years, it was nice to stay somewhat close to home (I'm not a big airplane person anyway) and spend one last vacation as a family of three.