Last week, we had a fabulous vacation in Ft. Walton Beach, FL. It's about 7 miles from Destin in the northwest panhandle of Florida.
We drove to Ft. Walton Beach. On the way there, we drove half way and spent the night in Baton Rouge. On the way back though we did the 10-11 hour drive all in one day - oy!
Joining us on our vacation were our good friends Jared & Amber and their 3 sweet kids. Jared and Michael grew up together in Rogers and they now live in Memphis. We shared a condo that had 3 bedrooms and 2 baths. We were all very pleasantly surprised by the condo and that it was even better than it looked in the pictures online. It was on the 6th floor which was the top floor of the condo and the condo was directly on the beach with the most amazing views.
Now I should back up that on the drive there, I was horribly sad thinking that tropical storm Debbie was going to ruin our vacation. But luckily, the day we got there she took a turn to the east and got out of our way! There were some clouds in the distance on the evening we got there but the rest of the week was blue skies and sunshine!
The week was so much fun! Every day we went to the beach and pool as much as we could in between meals and Joseph's 2 naps. The sand was white powder and the ocean was gorgeous. It was a little murky and rough at first due to the tropical storm in the gulf but it cleared up in the next day or two.
We bought all our groceries and ate breakfast and lunch everyday at the condo. 2 of the nights the guys grilled us steaks and fajitas and then the other 2 nights we went out to dinner at neat local seafood places - yum!
Joseph loved the beach and had a blast playing in the sand. Of course he managed to stick a couple of handfuls in his mouth - eek! He had fun playing in the ocean and enjoyed playing with Jared & Amber's kiddos too!
I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story - enjoy!
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| Enjoying the condo on the day we got there! |
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| Checking out the view from our balcony |
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| Our first night there we went out to the beach and there was a pretty rainbow in the clouds where the storm was off in the distance. |
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| The kids were so excited for their first walk on the beach and instantly started playing in the sand. |
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| Amber & Jared! |
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| hehe, love this little shot of him |
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| The first full day, the kids were SO excited to head out! |
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| Joseph and Daddy on the way to claim our umbrella and chairs for the day |
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| Fun in the sun! |
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| Amber and the kids working hard on the first sand castle of the trip |
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| That's Michael on the left and Jared on the right riding some waves |
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| Jared buried in the sand by Michael and his kids |
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| Joseph's sweet little footprints |
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| This is me on the left and Amber on the right - trying to figure out our plan for the wave coming right at us :P |
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| Michael and Jared made homemade peach icecream - it was delicious! |
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| Going for a swim |
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| Our condo building |
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| Playing in the pool - it was also a good way to get that last bit of sand out of our suits. :P |
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| Fuddpucker's Restaurant with baby alligators - we tried to eat there but the wait was an hour and 45 min so we ended up eating somewhere else. |
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| Enjoying some "beverages" before our nightly game of playing spades |
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| Beautiful ocean |
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| We so enjoyed sitting on our balcony (when we weren't out on the beach) and taking in the beautiful beach |
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| On the way to the beach. Joseph definitely learned his way around and just led the way! |
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| There was a second sandbar that was super shallow (ankle deep!). You walk through waist high water to get to it and then climb up, but then there is a nice flat sandbar with not much water and calm waves. Joseph LOVED it out there! It was so much easier to let him run around and sit and play out there. |
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| Having a blast! |
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| Love my sweet boy |
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| Here you can see the 2nd sandbar more which is where Michael and Joseph are. Gulf is to the left and water that leads to the beach is to the right. |
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| Family picture before dinner at Floyd's seafood |
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| Amber, Max, Sadie, Reid, and Jared |
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| On the last day, there was finally a good wind that we were able to get our kite up. |
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| Me and my little buddy enjoying our last evening on the balcony |
