July 5 at the North Shore

Monday:  Today was the "legal" holiday for July 4 ... so Emma had a paid day off! We decided that it would be nice to take advantage of an extra day, especially if the weather was clear, and go for a swim. Our Plan A was to go to Richmond Pool, since it is so nearby and there is no sea weed or algae, etc. We drove over there only to find people exiting by the handfuls as we were walking toward the entrance. I finally looked over at one of the families who were on their way to the parking lot and said: "It looks like everybody is leaving, and it's only 2:30--is there something wrong?" Duh. You would think that ONE of those people we had passed by would have bothered to tell us that the pool had been unexpectedly closed due to a child's diaper overflowing ... pooh!

I told Emma as we walked back to the car that it is always a good idea to have a Plan B ... or even a Plan C--just in case. Our Plan B was to drive to Lake Michigan and swim there! It's not that I don't LOVE LOVE LOVE Lake Michigan, but it IS a 45 minute drive and I do have Dylan and Kelly's kiddos on Tuesdays and my sister and brother are arriving Tuesday night and spending the night--I figured the pool at Richmond would be more convenient. But it wasn't meant to be! I'm SO glad.

We drove out to the Ferrysburg side of Grand Haven to North Park Beach on the North Shore road. Wouldn't you LOVE to live on a street named North Shore? We paid our $8 fee for the day, parked, and hauled our beach bag and swimming stuff way down the beach near the end. Emma was the first one brave enough to get in the VERY cold water.

The waves were absolutely DELICIOUS! They don't LOOK that great but I truly think they were 3-4 feet and their force could knock you right off your feet. I knew that I would be okay once I got used to the cold water, so I eventually got all the way in. I had a wave board with me for Emma to use, and we brought the "taco" blow-up we had used for Emma's party for me to float on. Ha! What a joke. First, I couldn't get air to fill the stupid thing up--so Emma did this for me. Once I put it in the water and tried to get ON it--I realized that with the waves, I was NEVER going to be able to hop on that thing--but in the meantime, the wind took off with it and it was blowing farther and farther away. I chased it and couldn't keep up with it but finally down the beach (WAY down the beach) it finally came ashore and a young fellow was nice enough to grab it for me. I was laughing so hard as I was chasing it and Emma pretended she didn't know me. Ha!

I don't know who these people are in my pictures of the waves, but I snapped these with my phone as we were packing up our stuff to return to the car.

As we had pulled into the parking lot I noticed a high dune with stairs going up and told Emma that we would walk to the top after we finished swimming--so we did!

I neglected to count the steps going up, but we descended another way and there were over 200 steps going DOWN. Here are the pictures from our climb:

Look at the view! It's just gorgeous up here!

Lots of pictures of Emma in her pretty dress ...

We only met a few people coming and going on the dune. It was a beautiful walk.

Since my favorite pier was only TWO miles south, we drove down to walk on the north pier.

I think Emma's body language below is indicative of how close I was standing to the edge of the pier and the number of pictures I had been taking ... she was a bit tired at this point.

We decided to forego a delicious ice cream treat and eat a decent meal instead, so we ate at Culver's (a frst for Emma) and then drove back to GR. What a nice way to spend our day off!