Miko and Me: By the Sea

Sally sells sea shells by the shiny sea shore
So she can see the shimmering silver ships
In sunshiny summers she strolls along the sea shore
shoelessly splashing somersaults while she skips

Greetings from the beautiful seashore in Delaware.

I actually got up at 6:00 this morning. I had planned on hitting the beach in Delaware but there is a giant low pressure system just south of Delaware which is causing huge winds and they were supposed to get stronger as the day went on. We all know how I feel about driving with wind. On top of this is that there was a Coastal Flooding Warning in effect for the seashore I was heading for. I was beginning to think that perhaps I should not be exploring the coast line at this particular time. Maybe the travel gods had it in for me. First the pope – now coastal flooding. I should probably look up what the seven plagues are, just to be prepared. I did call ahead to the park I was heading to and the ranger said that it was highly unlikely that I would need to worry about being flooded out.

Greg showed up at the rig around seven and proclaimed all systems were go. He also said that if I had any problems in the next couple of days he would come down to where I was at and get things fixed. What great customer service. Or maybe he was looking to get in a beach holiday. Naw - I'm very impressed with RV Solar Solutions and Greg.

I hooked up the car. It was difficult – seems like when I hook up the car, men seem to think they should come help me cause I'm just a poor little girl. While I appreciate the sentiment and it is very nice of them, I find that they are a distraction. I have a routine that I follow religiously, one step at a time and if I have somebody helping, it throws me off.

On the road at eight and it isn't too bad traveling wind wise. My biggest problem is that I'm pretty low on gas and there doesn't seem to be any gas stations. I finally see one, not the most ideal location because it is a tight squeeze to get in and out, but it is gas. It is $2.37 a gallon. Of course after I fill up about 50 gallons worth and get back on the road, there are all of a sudden tons of gas stations at $2.08. I should have checked my Gas Buddy app before I left the campground but as they say – hindsight is perfect.

It wasn't long before I crossed the border into Delaware. It was supposed to be a two and a half hour drive (three and a half in RV lingo) and part of it was on a toll road. I could have taken a non-toll road but it would have added on another 45 minutes to the trip. I'll pay the $12 to cut the time. The further south I head, the stronger the winds are getting. Even though they are a broadside east wind, they don't seem to push me around too much even though it looked like there were some trees that were really tossing and turning.

I'm heading to Delaware Shores State Park. To get there, you have to go through Rehoboth Beach which is one strip mall after another. The nice thing about this is that I only could go about thirty miles per hour which really helped cut down the wind issue.

I picked this place because the beach was only 150 yards from the campground. What they failed to mention is that there is a bridge and sand dunes between the campground and the beach so the view is negligible. I arrived about noon and check in time was 1:00 pm. My site was empty but they said I could not park until after 1:00pm. Ok then. Miko and I spent the time walking over to the beach. It was low tide and the wind was brutal. There were a couple of times that we sort of got blown backwards, it was that strong. I'm not sure that Miko had ever seen ocean before. It had all this white frothy stuff that was washing up. She ended up pretty much avoiding the surf – running backwards if the waves got too high. Typical kid.

We took several walks down the beach. The last one was about 7pm when the tide was quite high. The wind is blowing – if I were in New England, I would call this a baby nor'easter. There is something really thrilling when the wind gets going and the surf is pounding. It makes you feel alive – everything is just sharper, more on edge.

I'm not sure where I'm going tomorrow – I was thinking of heading down into Maryland – to the Assateague National Seashore where the wild ponies live but it is supposed to be cold and cloudy and windy tomorrow. Down there they not only have a Coastal Flooding alert, but also a Surf Alert – two alerts that we don't get in Minnesota. Cool, huh?

Pictures from the park (which is basically a sand parking lot – think RV park - I'm in site 465) and beach