Day 3 - More Mifi Fun

To follow up from the issue of last night, the failed mifi unit, the plan was to go to the local Verizon store first thing in the morning so we could get on the road for the drive to Bethany Beach, DE.  Luckily for us, the Verizon store was basically directly behind the hotel, so we could walk there.  Unfortunately, the store didn't open until 10, so that was going to delay the start of the travel day a bit.  However, another piece of good luck was on our side.  As we were driving down to Baltimore the other day, Debbie and I talked about finding a Whole Foods to stop at before we drove to DE so we could have some lunch food while at the beach house.  Well, it turned out that the hotel we stayed at in Baltimore was actually connected to a Whole Foods.  In fact, the parking spot where I parked the car at the hotel was about 10 yards from the entrance to Whole Foods. 

So, we loaded up the car in the parking garage and then headed into Whole Foods to stock up.  For those scoring at home, we purchased roast beef, roasted chicken, muenster cheese, goat cheese, avocados, tomatoes, crackers, hummus and, well, that may be it. We also purchased a cooler type bag and I got a bag of ice from the seafood department and we were done with the food.  The kids and I then headed to Starbucks for our gourmet breakfasts while Debbie headed to the Verizon store.  We wrapped up at Starbucks in about 10 minutes and started walking to the Verizon store.  As we were almost there, Debbie called me to say that the mifi wasn't working and that we would probably have to buy a new one.  We met her at the store, where she and I decided that we would get the nicer new one and go on the hook for another 2 year contract.  However, just at the moment Debbie was getting ready to pay, our original mifi kicked in (the Verizon guy had replaced the SIM card, but evidently it took a while for it to register).  After debating what to do, we decided to take a shot with our existing unit.  Of course, as soon as we started driving it wasn't working and we feared that we would have to waste more time at another store.  But the fates were with us, and it started working again and actually worked the rest of the way.

The drive from Baltimore should have taken 2.5 hours, but as we approached the Bay Bridge over Chesapeake Bay, we got slammed with traffic that wasn't moving.  It ended up taking just about an hour to go a whopping 2 miles, and as soon as we got over the bridge the traffic moved just fine.  Not really sure why we weren't moving for so long, other than the fact that the bridge has only 2 lanes.  Anyway, the drive for most of the way was basically local roads, and it felt like we were in Iowa, with a ton of corn fields.  Eventually we got onto Route 1 and arrived at the Tuckers' beach house at around 3:00.  We had a quick lunch, put our bathing suits on, "gooped up" and headed out to the beach.

We spent a very relaxing few hours on the beach, with all of the kids, Amanda included, spending a considerably amount of time in the water.  After a few hours, everyone headed up to the house to shower and get ready for dinner.  Primarily to satisfy Ethan's desire for crabs that went unfulfilled the other night in Baltimore, we went to a place that had crabs (and other items for the rest of us).  Ethan ordered 6 crabs, and after a key crab cracking lesson from Matt, he went to town on them and devoured all of the crab meat in the crabs, and likely some other stuff that maybe wasn't meant to be eaten.

After dinner we headed to the Boardwalk area for ice cream (and caramel popcorn for Jane) and hung out to eat the dessert.  There was a split vote on what to do next (mini-golf or head back to the house), and majority opted to head home, so home we went.  There was talk of watching a movie, but with the wide age range there was no way to come to a consensus on a movie so the group decided to play the "Name Game."  Everyone is writing down names now, as I type this, and it will either be a lot of laughs or a bomb.  I'm thinking it will be funny.  Anyway, I have to go write down 5 names, so I will sign off.

Since we will be at the beach for the next 2 days, I am not sure if I will be blogging over those days.  So, I will summarize what we will be doing - wake up, go out to beach, come in for lunch, go back to beach, come in to shower, debate where we should eat for about 45 minutes, pick a place, have dinner, have dessert, maybe play mini golf, head back to the house, rinse and repeat the next day.

If anything more happens I will post something.