Our first day at the beach was…a little bumpy. Just a little.
Colleen was not messing around after waiting years to get to the beach, so she was up, out the door, and in a chair on the sand by 6:30am. She did the things—journal, enjoy, reflect. And she saw a dolphin!
Bumpiness
Meanwhile, the kids and I slept in. After a bumpy breakfast (I do not remember what I fed them; I had only coffee, because that’s how I do), we all got over to the beach. Glorious. At some point Leen went back to the condo for a while to refresh and go pick up groceries and supplies.
While she was off doing that, we had a blast at the beach. The children splashed in the waves and hunted for seashells. I sat and sketched for a bit. Took some photos. Did some 'graming.
After a bumpy lunch (good lord the kids were unregulated), we got back out for more beach time.
I cannot state more often or clearly how perfect the weather was. The sand was perfect. The water was perfect. The colors during the day and evening were perfect. When people imagine an ideal beach, this was it. It didn't even seem real, as if we were trapped in a Matrix-style VR prison and they pacified our subconsciouses by creating a fake perfect beach and I don’t why I’m ruining the imagery for you sorry.
Afternoon beach time was also great. The kids did more of the same. We all did a lot of walking somehow. But Leen and I did get like an hour to sit together quietly on the beach, in chairs, under umbrellas. Delightful.
We went back and crashed in the condo later in the afternoon. Unsurprisingly, everyone was zonked. The kids laid in their beds and stared at screens. Leen passed out as well.
I was too excited to sleep. Adventures awaited! I couldn't help myself and went off on a short solo adventure. I walked down to the fishing pier, which is actually in the state park (I highly recommend staying near the state park). I walked a little further, nabbed a rideshare bike, and rode around the park for a while. The paved trails and boardwalks were pretty, the vegetation lush, the lake views stunning.
I ended up biking around a campground trying to find the nature center that is allegedly there, but I got lost. Eventually I started running out of daylight and had to hustle back to drop off the bike and zip back to the condo in enough time to grab everyone to go back to the beach and see the sunset.
Though the sun sets behind buildings where we were (doh), the colors were still beautiful. The light and energy on a beach at day's end is just one of the most glorious, extraordinary, gloridinary, extraglorinary things on Earth.
We eventually trudged back to the condo, tired. Camille was completely wiped. (We realized she hadn't had any water all day. Oops. Ack. We'll have to improve our parenting tomorrow…)
Because everyone was zonked, instead of going out to dinner, we ordered takeout. (A bumpy dinner to go with our bumpy breakfast and lunch. Oy.) I went and picked it up. We got Mexican from a place called Cactus Cantina. Fish tacos, seafood burrito, and an amazing cheesy sauce thing that was full of various meats. I also got local beer.
Ice Cream Cartel?
For some reason determined to Do More Things after a day that drained everyone to the point that they were no longer food-motivated, I pushed for ice cream. So, after dinner, Es and I ran out to get ice cream for everyone.
It was getting late, but not THAT late—9:30pm or so—and the only place that was open late enough was Matt's Ice Cream. And so we went.
Listen: I am not ashamed to admit that I attempted a fair amount of Gulf Shores ice cream parlor research before our trip. There are numerous ice cream places in this little town, and when we’re traveling, we get ice cream pretty much every night. But there are only so many days on the trip and so many ice cream places to hit, so I did not want to waste time on something boring, chain-y, or sucky.
Matt's was (allegedly) voted #1 ice cream in Alabama. And it's located in this little plaza next to an apparently famous/infamous/popular restaurant called the Oyster House. The whole plaza is beach-retro, with lots of boardwalky fun and cute little shops.
Besides, Matt’s was high on my list of ice creameries anyway. In the images online, it had colorful, stylized decor, with a menu to match. And some of the menu items sounded like specialty items—officially named sundaes and the like, probably derived from Matt’s inside jokes with family and friends.
It is at this point in the story that I must tell you, dear reader, that I have come to believe all of the details in the preceding paragraph to be artifice. Artifice! Upon visiting other sellers of frozen delights throughout our time in Gulf Shores, I found that all of the ones we visited were decorated suspiciously similar to Matt’s.
Perhaps I was reading too much into it. There’s probably a fair amount of copycat style and decor around the town. But…mmmmmmmmm. We go to another place. The menu…seems almost identical. We go to aNOTHer place...the menu seems almost identical.
Identical, as in there seems to be the same array of flavors—and there were many flavors, but not SO many flavors that overlap is a statistical likelihood. The same minimal sundae options, with the same or similar nomenclature.
Granted, I have done no research whatsoever to back up the bold claim I’m about to make, but in my gut I firmly believe that…
…Gulf Shores, Alabama is in the frosty grip of an ice cream cartel.
I believe that the ice cream families have all gotten together to fix prices, tighten hours of operation, and limit menus in an effort to control costs. To I-L-L-E-G-A-L-L-Y control costs! Someone needs to get several acronymed government agencies over there ASAP!
Cartel or no, we were on a mission to get ice cream. But that night, Matt’s was TURNT. There was a line in front and behind us. And they were out of everything. The one girl was too tired to scoop any more. (What a sentence!) She said she’d been there 11 hours and that it had been busy like that the whole time. (Hmm, sounds like the sort of illegal labor practices a cartel would dare to enforce, knowing full well that this hapless college freshman had to either suck it up or get out of the ice cream scooping business in this town altogether!)
The result: There was nothing there that Es wanted. Is there anything sadder than a child going on an ice cream retrieval mission and getting nothing? I promised her I’d made it up to her.
I got something for Leen. I got something for Camille (that I knew she wouldn’t consume, but you have to get her the thing—it’s always just ice cream theater with that one). I got a “sea foam” slushie. It's just sorbet + Sprite. All they had left was mango, but it was gooooood. (This particular frozen confection became part of my Ice Cream Cartel Conspiracy Theory. I assumed it was unique to Matt’s, for I had never heard of it before. Until I realized it was available at the other places, too.) Though delicious, I would not have complained if Overworked Ice Cream Girl dumped a few ounces of tequila in there.
Anyway. By the time we got back to the condo, Leen had to wake up to get her ice cream, which she did, because this is vacation dammit, and that's what you do.
Working (Too Hard) For It
One of my most important travel tips involves meeting the needs of the persons in your adventure party. And so, on our second full day of Gulf Shoresing, that was my primary aim: to make sure the children had a blast.
I went too hard and expected too much. Alas.
I took Es shopping in the morning. She loved it. We hit up the goofy souvenir stores, some of which had goofy names and themes. Mostly tchotchkes and terrible clothes. All sea-themed. We grabbed a couple of souvenirs, sunnies and a hat for me, and some miscellany from Target that the family needed. It took all morning and also much of my physical and emotional energy.
Somehow, Leen and I managed to extract ourselves and go off for a couples-only lunch jamboree. We went to a hipstery place called Picnic. It’s the very worst (and therefore the very best) version of a themed restaurant. There are lots of baskets. The floor is artificial turf. The tables are picnic tables. Do you get it? “Picnic”?
The menu is limited, but delicious. I had a shrimp boil doused in a sauce to die for. After, we walked off lunch with a stroll on the beach.
Then: TIME TO GO HARD AGAIN. Leen actually had to take a meeting for work for a couple hours, which was a perfect amount of time for me to take the kids by myself to a place called The Track, where they had go karts, mini golf, and arcades.
I don’t know where these ungrateful, unfun children came from, but if I had gone to this place as a youth, I would have immediately become concerned that I was deceased and this was heaven.
There are SIX go kart tracks, each one bigger and zanier than the last! One is elevated like a roller coaster and made entirely of wood, and is therefore wonderfully dangerous and therefore deeply appealing. The kids did the kiddie track to warm up, but that was enough for Camille. Then Es did the next two tracks, each increasing in danger and difficulty, and then was done. Too vibratey, apparently.
They bickered like wet cats in the arcade, and I did a small amount of yelling at them. I threatened to drag them out of there. They blanched, because they could tell I was serious. I…had gone too hard and set expectations too high, and I was paying for it.
They pulled it together to stave off eviction. Even so, I had to convince them to try mini golf (again, who are these children???), which they did fortunately enjoy.
They also liked the little-kid roller coaster, and then tried the bumper boats (I didn’t tell them how wet they would get thanks to the boat-mounted water cannons, but they forgave me), and then we spent the rest of our time and money on arcade games.
Then back to the condo, off to dinner at a fun place called Luna’s, ice cream next door afterwards (gosh that menu SURE SEEMED FAMILIAR), and then bed. The kids ended up having a sweet Sister Sleepover (which is just when they sleep in the same place).
I stayed up for a while and sat on the patio, sipping (okay, chugging) beer and waiting for the storm to blow in. It finally rained. Sheets. By the morning, it was done. The winds remained, and there were huge puddles around, but on the whole it was as if nothing happened. The next day presented an opportunity to…not go so hard.
This piece is part of a series of pieces around our recent spring break trip. There’s more to come, but you can catch up to where we are so far by reading these. In chronological order: