Beach Highlights Part II

I love the beach. Always have. I think it goes back to when I was a kid and we took several trips to the beach for vacation. I have great memories of riding the waves with my dad, looking for sea shells with my mom and building lots of sand castles. And swimming in the hotel pool. I love the smell, the sound, and the feel of the sand on my feet. Sure, the sand is invasive to the body but I love it. We took several walks along the beach and Ewan has turned out to be my assistant explorer. He liked looking for shells and walking in the water. Isaac doesn't like getting splashed so he was wary of walking along the shoreline and got bored looking for shells. He brought along some Star Wars guys to play with one day and kept himself entertained that way. We found hermit crabs and a dead horseshoe crab.

One morning, Jon took Ewan and Isaac to a local aquarium while Graham and I stayed behind so he could nap. After he took a nap we went out for a walk with him strapped in my Mai Tai. I got quite the workout, let me tell you. Walking in the sand works different muscles and my body felt the weight of carrying him around.

While we were on our walk, I found the coolest Conch shell buried in the sand! I was walking along and saw something sticking out of the sand. I moved some of the sand away with my toe and realized that it was a VERY cool shell. So I dug it up. Then I realized that the Conch animal was still inside of it! Up until that point I was excited that I had found the best shell I had ever come upon. There was no way I was going to kill the animal just to have the shell so I layed it back down in the sand and watched it bury itself again. The animal was very slow to bury itself so I tried helping it. Of course Graham started getting fussy and was ready to eat so I had to head back to the hotel. I was nervous about leaving because I didn't want anyone else to come along and find it and take it home. No one had been walking around where I was but I was still nervous that someone would see it. I felt like I had a moral dilemna. If I left it there and someone else found it and took it home then would it be okay for me to just take it? I knew I wouldn't feel right about that but I also knew it would feel unfair for someone else to take it. So I left hesitantly and sure enough as I was leaving a man and his son shortly walked by, found the conch, picked it up and carried it off. I thought about running after them and telling them I thought they should throw it back in the ocean and then I kicked myself for not thinking of that earlier! I guess I thought it needed to be near the shoreline or something but I should have given it a good toss.

The shell was about as big as my foot!

I kind of hope that some day I will live on or near the beach. I find it peaceful and relaxing.