Some Beach, Somewhere...but specifically Pensacola, FL

Leaving Baton Rough.  456 miles down, ??? to go!

We continued our adventure to the east with a stop in Pensacola, FL.

Back in the day, I was stationed at NATTC Pensacola for AT-O A-school.  It was a weird time in my life, but with fun in the sun, beach volleyball, and sand, sand, and more sand!

We pulled through P'cola, through Gulf Breeze, and over the bridge to Santa Rosa Island.  We walked the boardwalk, ate a yummy dinner with the salt breeze cooling us.  We put our toes in the sand and looked forward to tomorrow.

  We found our camp site at Ft. Pickens National Park, right on Santa Rosa Island.  After we set up the tent, we went to watch the sunset over one of the cannon stations, but missed the event.

Tomorrow is another day.

We got up early.  Like, stupid early.  5:30.  I checked my phone and found that sunrise over Ft. Pickens was at 5:50.  Kayleigh and I put three sleepy headed, pajama clad kiddos in the car and drove a quarter of a mile to another cannon bastile.  We were just in time.

Since we were up, and swimsuits were in the car, we opted to take the beach while it was cool and we had the place to ourselves.

The kids, of course, were excited!

I left my camera in my purse (sandy, wet cameras tend to not work as well), so you'll just have to take my word that we had a BLAST!  First, we chased ghost crabs across the beach into the surf.  Then, we covered Gannon in sand and gave him a mermaid tail.  Then, we watched dolphins (YES, HOLY GEEZ, WE SAW DOLPHINS) swim 100 yards behind us.  

By 0800, we were all swam out, and ventured to Ft. Pickens.

Ft. Pickens was both a Revolutionary and Civil War Fort, used to protect the Bay of Pensacola.  It was one of 4 forts in the bay, and a beautiful historic site.

The kids (and I) were amazed that the cannon holder is made of OAK.  Wood.  Crazy. 

This room was filled with gun powder!

Looking out on a series of tunnels that were used to run supply loads.

Prison.  They're lucky I let them out... ;-)

We had a fantastic time, the kids earned their Jr. Ranger badges.  It was hot, we'd started early, so we loaded the car, and Annika was asleep before we'd left the island.  

 We headed North to.........