Beach and Boardwalk

We spent an evening with the Hartkes on the the Santa Cruz Boardwalk--it's one of their favorite places to go, and we hadn't been yet. It was great!!

We had a picnic on the beach for supper. There's just something relaxing and enjoyable about eating a sandwich with the sea breeze blowing through and the sound of the waves crashing in.

Matt bought 2 funnel cakes for dessert--one original (just with powdered sugar) and another loaded with strawberries, ice cream, and whipped cream. Yummy!!

After our funnel cake we headed for the rides.

Matt didn't last long with Abby on his shoulders. She was very squirmy.

Jenna and Abby had fun on all the kiddie rides.

Smiles--even though they didn't get their favorite rainbow (Jeff Gordon) car.

Ready for take-off in their helicopter!

And the adults took turns watching the girls to enjoy some rides of their own.

Matt and Nate getting ready to ride the roller coaster Hurricane--Laura went with Nate next and they got the front car. Megan wasn't going to risk losing her supper on this ride.

Matt and Megan rode the Ghost Blasters ride where you get to use a laser gun to shoot at the ghosts. It keeps score... and Megan won 1140 to 1070!!

We enjoyed the rides we could all go on together too.

This was no ordinary carousel--it dispensed rings that you could grab and then try to throw into the mouth of a clown that was painted on the wall. No one in our group made it in this time.

Jenna enjoying the ride.

And it wouldn't be a successful Boardwalk trip if you didn't try deep-fried Twinkies or Oreos. So, yes, we tired them both. It was actually pretty tasty!(And for those of you who are wondering, the calorie count for the Twinkies is about 425 each and for the Oreo, 80--I looked it up on google.)

Thank you Hartkes for a very fun night--we are going to miss you guys!