We just spent a wonderful week at the beach with our best friends. It was SUCH a great week. The weather was amazing. Our condo was beautiful. The kids had so much fun and so did we.
I had a lot of questions asked while we were there so I thought I would try to answer some while I do blog posts. Some of the most popular were:
1. Where did you stay?
2. Where did you eat?
3. How do you do the whole "travel with friends"?
4. Tips on beach/traveling with little kids?
So I will cover those and any more you might want to ask in the comments.
We have been going to the gulf coast for about 15 years. I went with friends back when I was single and the Scott and I started coming with the Ormons back before kids and have gone together most years since. We used to go to Gulf Shores, AL but about 6 years or so ago - we stayed in Perdido Key, FL (about 30 min away) and it is less crowded and we love it.
We have stayed at the Indigo every year - but always in a different condo. We love it. It's clean and beautiful. The beach is really nice and so is the pool. They have an elevator that opens up into each condo so you never have to see the other condos. I always book on VRBO.
I think the one we stayed in this year was my very favorite. It is Indigo West 1904. It had 4 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms so we had a ton of room. I loved the decor.
There were two master rooms with king beds which worked out great for the adults and then this room was perfect for all the kids but Emily because they all wanted to be together and the bunk bed had a trundle bed that WH slept on. Then Emily had her own room with a double bed and her own bathroom - which was perfect for a tween girl!
And of course - the kids love the pool WAY more than they love the ocean so we spent a lot of time here and it's so nice. I know that 30A is gorgeous and we have a ton of friends who go there and Destin as well but this is just a little closer to us (it's already a 12 hour drive) and we just love all the restaurants and the vibe. Also we love to have a condo that has a view of the ocean so we can sit out on the balcony all day long and just look at it. We always eat breakfast and lunch on the balcony and sit out there as much as possible to soak up the view!
We are fans of driving through the night. I don't know how Scott does it but he does. He likes to drive when there is no traffic and everyone is quiet and asleep. So we left our house around 10:30 Friday night. We stopped in Mississippi at the Waffle House for breakfast around 6:30.
We got to Perdido around noon. Our check in wasn't until 4 but luckily we were able to get in early around 2 so while we waited we ate lunch and made a quick Target run.
So happy to be at the beach!!! It is so worth the drive!
As quick as we could - we hit the beach. So happy to have sand between our toes. We did some swimming and ordered pizza in that night. We always order pizza the first night and go to bed super early after being up all night the night before. We were all asleep before 8.
Which of course meant we were up at the crack of dawn on Sunday. We were down at the beach by 8 a.m. I love mornings on the beach because it's always very non crowded and we love to be some of the first in the ocean.
The Ormons came a day later and got to the beach Sunday afternoon. We spent all day in the ocean and the pool.
It was Father's day so we let the men pick where we would eat that night. We all got ready and headed out for an early dinner. (My dress is Free People but it's not on their site any more).
These three girls had the BEST time together last week.
The guys chose Cobalt. It was crowded and a nice night so we ate outside. It's so pretty and seemed like such a good idea.
BUT the gnats are awful this year and they ate us alive. This was the last meal we ate outside last week. The gnats didn't bother us during the day but they came out in droves at night.
Laurie doesn't like fancy food but she LOVES oysters. She got a big platter at every restaurant.
Laurie and I always have fun together. We did an instagram live while we were at the beach. It was fun to answer questions and talk about friendship! Maybe one day we will do another one. We would start a podcast if we had any idea how to do that or if we would make time to do it - which is unlikely!
