A week of beachlife

A week on the beach with good warm weather...for me that's the perfect vacation. Over the last years I have learned that I excell really well in doing nothing.  I strive for doing nothing.  No plans make for me a really good vacation rhythm. 
I also learned this summer that this becomes increasingly difficult with an adolescent who wants to know what we are going to do and who clearly wasn't as pleased with "going to the beach again" as answer. 

Anyway, my and Jan's plan on the beach is to read.  Since Jan discovered Jo Claes the last summers and has since then read all of them, he prepared himself by buying second hand 18 Aspe books.  

So we did...reading. Although I didn't read as many books as I anticipated. And Kabouter was not impressed by the books he brought anymore and after a few tries didn't want to read anymore (unlike last vacations). 

The boys got fishing again and filled each day a bucket with some shrimp etc, which had to get released again in the evening.  Especially at low tide, it was good to fish in the extra puddles on the beach. 

Beertje had brought along his remote controlled super truck that he could ride 15 minutes a time before it needed recharging :D. 

Kabouter had brought his metal detector which he had asked and gotten for his birthday a year ago.  We had hardly used and tested it but he had looked forward using it on the beach. It became a disappointment though as it beeped so often but we didn't find anything. We learned that wet sand creates false alarms and that the waving needs a very good correct technique etc.  It's better not to practise on the beach but elsewhere of course is much less chance to find something.   He had clearly hoped it to be different and was very disappointed.

They played soccer a few times with other kids and both really had fun doing that!

Unlike last year when digging and building forts was the main activity, this got ignored for the first couple of days.  The tides weren't favourable with the high tide in the morning and the low tide in the afternoon. But by the end that changed and I had to point it out a couple of times to the boys that they could build forts against the upcoming tide again.  The last days they fully went for it and tried to conquer the tides...in vain of course.

And the high tide came much higher than before the last 2 days so they also helped to dig the neighbouring friends to protect their goods and on the last days we also had to dig an trench last minute. 

I really admire their Vauban structure! Once it started flooding, it looked so good! 

He lost, the digging captain waved goodbye

Protecting the belongings of friends

And protecting our spot after Vauban lost and the sea moved a bit too close to our seats as well. 

Digging a bit with friends toddler's.

The adolescent on the beach

The last days were the hottest so we were increasingly playing in the sea. Even I swam twice on the last day. That doesn't happen too often. 

I wish it had lasted longer than a week!