Back and Forth

We're back, back home that is. Decided we needed a little lovin' from the "father" and hub and momma (not to mention the teenager). We snuck back into town yesterday afternoon. Total uneventful drive, which is gud.

Our norm is to have beignets before we leave the beach. This area has a lot of New Orleans' influences, including their foods, since they're right across the Bay from us. You can find cajun food mingling in the menus with the seafood dishes and several Creole restaurants scattered about. Yum. Our favorites along the Gulf Coast were knocked out by Hurricane Ivan a few years back and only a few have returned. A mainstay is the Beignet Cafe in Orange Beach. It has been our tradition to get our beignets and cafe au lait before heading home. Since the kid and I wasn't sure when we were leaving, we went on Friday, deciding to spend a day at the shore. Oh my. Nothing like adding a few pounds to the already fat, bathing suit clad woman! They were soooooooo good!

It was actually too hot to make it to the beach, so we drove around looking at all the new construction happening along the shoreline. Amazing. Like I mentioned, so much had been lost during Ivan. (These pics were taken by the kid through the back window in the spring of 1995--a full six months after the hurricane hit--dead on.) It was truly sad to see the devastation throughout Orange and Gulf Shores; but I'm here to say, they are gung ho on building the place up. Which actually is kind of sad. All of the sweet houses that were flattened are being replaced by these huge high rise monstrosities, of course. You can see where they were, completely demolished, only sand and debris where houses once stood. Today, there are cranes everywhere rebuilding. Here is out tranquil setting as we sat and ate lunch at one of our favorites, Bahama Bob's. Looks delightful, but it was hot out on that sand, let me tell you! We stayed in the shade where a nice breeze blew through as we ate.

We then high tailed it back to Fairhope where we found a public pool in town. It was nice. We spent all day floating about until we became waterlogged. It was just perfect.

Friday night, we found a new restaurant where the locals go. It is off the beaten path and it had a lot of cars in the parking lot. That was a sure sign that it was good--my daddy always taught us that. "If there's no cars in the parking lot, pass it by!" As soon as we walked in, it reminded me of a restaurant my parents used to frequent, faithfully, every Saturday night when we were teenagers. I guess they figured we were old enough to stay at home and they had their "date" once a week. It was at least an hour's drive towards the Chesapeake Bay in Wayson's Corner, Maryland, where the blue line ends. (You can also see the Rod 'n' Reel Club on the map, that's a whole other haunt or ours growing up!) I had almost forgotten about the place until the kid and I entered The Blue Marlin. OMG! Talk about another flashback--this time a good one, thank goodness. The smells, the tables, the old wood panelling, the saltines on the table! hehe. I could never understand why my parents would drive that far for a hole in the wall, I mean, that's about all that was there, the restaurant, a gas station, etc. But they would, and I now know it was for the fresh seafood. I remember a few times, I had to go. You know the age, where you're almost old enough to stay at home alone but not quite. (Actually, when I think about it, I was pretty darn old! Maybe 9 or 10, gee, I just don't remember. I've left my kids alone a lot younger than that!) Anyway, not being a big seafood eater, I would always choose something from the landlubber section, probably fried chicken or salisbury steak--I doubt it even had a children's menu. My parents would always get the Captain's Plate consisting of a piece of every fresh fish caught that day, ew. Ha, I remember if they got home late, my mom would inevitably forget and leave her extra fish, always wrapped neatly in a paper napkin (before all these styrofoam containers, folks), in her purse. Our cats would drag it out before daybreak and have a feast and she would wake up grumbling about it in the morning. Aw, what fond memories. Anyway, a little off the beaten path there but worth mentioning just the same. The kid had fried shrimp and I had boiled. I miss the steamed shrimp from the Chesapeake area. Pout. Up there, they steam them with Old Bay spices which make them absolutely delish. In Bama, they just boil or steam them plain. I'm going to have to start carrying my own Old Bay with me, grin. Ya think I would embarrass the kids? I want MY OLD BAY!

We got back home, stuffed to the gill, and we made the decision that we would sneak back home on Saturday, not tell a soul. Which we did. I had a short meeting with the carpenter about 10:30 and then we were out of there. We waived goodbye to Riverside and headed North. (More of the kid's photos above.) Made it home about 6 p.m. Sigh. Good to be home with our loved ones. Mom is well, very happy to see us, the hub was amazed to see us and I think the teenager was confused when he heard my voice coming from the kitchen. Oh yea, you can tell we're home! Look at all the junk!


Now we await my niece's arrival (the cuz) on Tuesday! Yippee! She'll be with us for the summer!! CanNOT WAIT to see her! We are all beside ourselves.