Salisbury Beach

On day five we woke up early and headed for Salisbury Beach near the Massachusetts/New Hampshire border and set up tents in the Salisbury Beach State Reservation. That's right--beach camping!

Warren actually thought the campground was more like a refugee camp, we didn't care. We could walk to the beach! We arrived late afternoon, so it wasn't too crowded.

The water was a tad frosty, but again, we didn't care. We were at the beach! The boys played in the waves, and Tasha ran along the sand.

Satchel dug a giant hole. Later we filled it with monkeys.

Jiro and Miles wanted to stay all night, but we were hungry and ready to get back to camp for dinner.

Warren made us a feast of hot dogs, shish kabobs, and rice & beans.

After dinner we went on a night hike along the shore to look for crabs. That's always Satchel's favorite part about the beach, but sadly there were no crabs to be found. However, on his morning walk with Warren, he did finally discover some small ones among the sea weed.

We spent the morning on the beach, grabbed a nice lunch at the nearby Hungry Traveler restaurant, and then headed home.

Lobster roll!

Warren insisted we take a small detour to see Jack Kerouac's grave. He'd looked unsuccessfully for it twenty years earlier when he lived in Boston, but felt that now with the aide of his iPhone he'd have no trouble. It wasn't as easy to find as we thought, but we found it.

We made it back to the house with just enough time to shower and get ready for dinner at Vanessa and Liz's friends' house in Easthampton.

They had a gorgeous backyard that included a field big enough for the kids to play soccer, a pool, several gardens, an obstacle course/"death trap," and a mobile Airstream/guesthouse.

The friends also had two boys and a Wii, so the monkeys got a quick fix between playing Legos and soccer. Warren and I enjoyed meeting their friends and we had a lovely dinner under the stars.

Needless to say, by the time we got home, we all went to bed exhausted.