Santa Cruzin'

When you're a swim family, you only really have 2 weeks of true summer vacation.  2 weeks when you can sleep in, lounge around and go where the wind blows you.  In this case, the wind blew me into my office to cram in some work into week 1 so we could go on a beach vacation in week 2.

We took advantage of our season passes to the Boardwalk and the numerous great beaches within an hour and a half drive and spent the week in Santa Cruz.  The trip was the opposite of relaxing as we packed our days with activities - we'd hit the Boardwalk for a couple of hours in the morning, check of different beaches in the afternoon and wrap up the evening with kite flying on the beach, a nice dinner or getting ice cream in Capitola.  I'll let the pictures tell the whole story...

Just arriving at our beach rental

We went to Capitola for lunch and hung out the beach

Whitney's sand castle creation

Flying kites after dinner

Candy apples at the Boardwalk to start off Day 2

Afternoon boogie boarding at Sunny Cove beach

And playing beach ball - Gwen and Adam made it to 7 hits!
Her summer playing tennis every day seems to be paying off.

Making new friends on the beach

Starting off Day 3 at the Boardwalk

My brave little girl!

Back to the beach!  Gwen loved playing in the waves

And Whitney was all about digging holes

Dinner at the upscale Shadowbrook Restaurant

Taking the tram down to the dining room

Spending the morning at the beach while Adam was
at a work meeting

Paige loved playing with all the dogs on the beach

Enough of the beach - on to a hike amongst the
Redwoods

A hollowed out tree where General Fremont once
slept

Inside the Fremont Tree

One last morning at the Boardwalk

Gwen and Whitney had the top scores for the
Lazer Maze Challenge!

Getting tattoos - Gwen chose dolphins, Whitney chose
a flower and Paige chose a giant black spider!

Checking out the tide pools - we found sea urchins,
hermit crabs, mussels and other tiny sea creatures

The remaining natural bridge at Natural Bridges
State Park

One last evening of kite flying

Our vacation was way too short for Whitney, who kept saying that she wanted to live in Santa Cruz forever.  But, lucky for her, it's a short drive and easy trip, so we'll definitely be back!