Beach 2020
The pandemic has messed with a lot of plans for a whole lot of people. One of those things for us was our vacations. We had a Disney vacation planned with my parents in late August which we cancelled because we were not entirely comfortable getting to Disney safely during the pandemic. In January, we were planning to do a BIG Disney trip just us 3. We had planned to stay around 10+ days at two resorts. This would be our last during the school year trip since Melody starts Kindergarten next year. But it is hard for us to justify that kind of money for a visit that doesn’t include park hopping. I mean we love to start at one park and end at Epcot for dinner. Instead we are hoping to take a smaller trip with my parents in January. However we did keep a trip we were hoping for, the beach. This trip wasn’t something planned out far in advance. We just knew we wanted to take a trip to the beach just us 3. COVID did really mess with how we do the beach, but we made it work the best we could.
We decided to go to Destin and stay at Tops’l. We knew by staying here, we would have easy access to a lot of restaurants nearby. This was important since we knew we would likely be getting our seafood to go and we wanted it still good when we got back to the condo. We opted to go during Melody’s fall break. We only stayed 4 nights because it allowed us to keep our doctor appointments we had later in the week, and it was also a good bit cheaper. [In the end this worked because of the hurricane they were expecting that never hit.]
Because it was just us, and we wanted to limit our time inside of stores, I made an intense packing list. I planned every meal (you can see the last two pictures for that), then I made multiple lists to correspond to that. So one list was of all the things we planned to bring that was not ordinary luggage. One bag was packed for food to have easy access to in the car. This was various snacks and even easy meals for Melody (peanut butter crackers). Then I made a list of all the groceries we intended to bring. I didn’t want to have to buy syrup, a box of fiber bars, sweetener, etc. So things we have plenty of here and use often, I was able to pack and avoid buying more while there. Then I had a grocery list fo either Publix or Walmart once there. I also had a packing list of Melody, and a packing list for all of our beach things. We were able to load everything except our bottled water, so we bought some there.
As part of Melody’s beach happy, we last minute (like the morning of) bought this travel tray for Melody to use on the drive. I wasn’t as concerned about the drive to the beach because we were breaking that trip up (more to come), but I was concerned she would want it on the 6+ hour drive home. It was neat, and for $20 I would say it was worth it. It did not stay as sturdy as I would have hoped, but I don’t think we had it correctly placed on the carseat. We also have a fairly large carseat. It did work really well in my mom’s car recently. Her carseat does not have cup holders so I think that helps.
So after we picked up Melody from school on the Friday before her fall break, we drove to Montgomery to stay the night. Normally we would get up early the day of our beach arrival and get there around 10 am. We would spend time at the outlets, let Melody play on the playground, and grab lunch. Then we would get groceries and arrive at check in time at 4. Well with COVID that was not an option. So Montgomery was half way, and we stayed in a Homewood Suites at Eastchase. Melody and I stayed there a year ago with my mom for a work trip. Each room is “sealed” so you know its clean. And fun fact, Melody asked if that lake in our window was the beach, ha. She has been to the beach many times, but she thought we were going there that night. For dinner, we ordered Red Robin down the street. We did online order, which is nice, but you also can’t customize things as much that way. Like I would have liked one thousand island and one ranch for my salad instead of two thousand islands. I also wanted to order Melody a milk (which I know they have), but they didn’t offer it online. Either way, it was really good and something different. We have a Red Robin here at home, but it is quite a drive and I don’t think it would be fresh to-go.
After dinner, we went outside and explored some. We wanted Melody to burn some energy before bed.
The next morning we got ready and made it downstairs around 9:05. FYI breakfast stops being served at 9. Thankfully they were cleaning up the bagged breakfast options and were nice enough to give us two along with some milk for Melody. Due to COVID, they now provide your breakfast in a bag. You don’t get an option other than fruit choice (banana or orange in our case). You can see the items contained in the bag below. The bars and water were great for the road. I ate a banana and muffin, and Melody had the other muffin along with her breakfast I Brough with us.
We called and got a late checkout of 1 pm. So we watched College GameDay in our room and packed things up slowly. We left the hotel around 12, and we left town close to 1 after running an errand and getting some Starbucks.
On our way in, we stopped at Walmart to get our groceries. This was Melody’s first time in a Walmart since the pandemic started. She was excited to say the least, even if you can’t tell below!
We made it to our condo around 5. We immediately went in and started to unpack. The crowds didn’t look too bad this evening. We ordered take out from Ocean Club. It is located at the entrance of the resort. We both ordered the grouper. Ordering was difficult. I called and kept getting hung up on, so Brad had to just go up there, order, then wait. The food was surprisingly good and fresh. I highly recommend their takeout (although it is quite pricey at almost $90 for two entrees after tip). After dinner we did walk down to the beach for a few minutes before getting our baths.
I made pancakes the next morning, and we decided to head down to the beach. We had planned for this to be our main beach morning visit. The other days we were aiming to do the beach in the afternoons. Melody was ready to go!
We found a spot not too close to anyone and set up. Melody needed her chair on the blanket to minimize sand contact. She wanted to build sand castles as long as she could sit on the blanket, ha.
Justin and Emily were also at the beach at the same time. We didn’t plan the trip together, but it was the girls’ fall break at the same time, and we all happen to love Tops’l. It made sense to at least try to get the girls together as much as possible because they feed off each other and would entertain themselves better together. Melody became braver when Lydia arrived. They played at the shoreline, they built sandcastles, they attempted to bury Lydia’s legs, and they continuously buried random toys so that they could go and dig up their “treasure”. I am fairly certain there are some missing beach toys buried in that sand to this day. We all ate snacks before heading up around 12:30 or so.
Brad and I only took this one picture together the entire trip. Priorities sure have changed!
And in case anyone is curious, below are the rental prices. We opted to bring our own chairs this trip. We didn’t have a need for the umbrella because it was overcast and the rest of the trip we went down late in the day. But we could have rented an umbrella if needed.
Melody and I headed up while Brad went to the pool bar to get us lunch. I did try to take a selfie with him. He is right by the bar! Oh, look at those crowds. The beach was packed this trip. It was more packed than any previous trip we have take. For lunch, I had the tuna dip (AMAZING!), and Brad had the burger. He said it was all really good and better than our last visit there a few years ago.
After lunch, Melody wanted to go to the pool. So we went down for about an hour or so. The water was way too cold, so I only stuck my feet in, but Melody was a trooper and swam the entire time with her Barbie.
We then headed up, showered, and ran over to the outlets. We had only 2-3 stores on our must do list. One was the Disney Outlet. This was the line. A lot of the stores had lines outside to get in. Way too busy for our comfort. We only did this store. Brad did Polo while I did Tory Burch, then we called it.
I didn’t take any pictures, but we drove around town to find a shrimp market to get steamed shrimp for dinner. Our usual place closed early, and our second place closed altogether. Our third choice was Publix. I wasn’t a fan of this, but thankfully they did offer fresh gulf shrimp too. So we got that and crab for me. We came back to the room and I boiled some corn and potatoes. Then we ate before calling it a night!
The next morning we opted to not go to the beach early. Instead we ate breakfast and had coffee. Brad and Justin decided to go together to get our lunch from Crab Trap. They left around 10:45 to get there when they opened at 11. We went back and forth about eating there. But with the crowds we had already seen, I didn’t want to get there and have to leave or become uncomfortable mid-meal. While the guys were gone, I took both Melody and Lydia to the pool. They played some in the kiddie pool, but spent most of their time in the main pool with puddle jumpers on.
I had the Crab Trap Trio for lunch. Everything was really good and nothing tasted bad due to the drive. I will say they did not provide any crab crackers, but I brought my own. And the butter for the corn was melted because it was tossed in the container with hot food. But I had my own butter anyhow. We spent the next few hours relaxing in the room.
We headed to the beach around 4. The kids had a lot of fun just playing in the sand and shoreline. We brought the kids dinner down to the beach, so they got extra time this evening. We even stayed late enough for them to hunt crabs. Each of the girls caught 3.
We went up and got Melody ready for bed. After her bedtime, Brad and I ate dinner. I had a veggie tray and some other snacks while Brad had a frozen pizza. Unfortunately the pool bar closed at 7, and we didn’t come back up until close to 8. Our big lunch did keep us full though.
So we all brought clothes for beach pictures, but we were not sure how we would fit it in our last day and still do the beach in the evening. Luckily it was overcast, so we opted for morning pictures. It wasn’t ideal, but it worked well so that we could still go about our day as we wanted. We even saw some planes overhead. It was very 2020 in that there were dead fish all at the shoreline. Luckily I could photoshop them out.
After pictures, we sent the guys to get Stinky’s for lunch. That was the biggest cluster of the week (and that is saying a lot). They got there at 11. They placed their orders from two different waitresses. What we wanted wasn’t offered to Brad, but was offered to Justin. Brad asked to changed ours, and they complied. 30 minutes later they get the food but it is wrong. It is the original order. They told Brad it would be another 30 minutes to change it (we just wanted a different side item). The manager refused to do anything else and so we were stuck with what they gave us. Don’t get me wrong, it turned out fine. The food was great as usual. But the customer service was awful, and they did not deserve the tip we gave. They also charged a take out fee on top of that. So we won’t be going back for take out there ever again.
Again, we made it down to the beach around 3-4. Melody braved getting into the ocean on this night. She was slightly uncomfortable, but she still enjoyed it. Again, we had dinner on the beach for the girls. We didn’t stay quite as late this night. While we were in Florida, Governor Ivey had issued a mandatory evacuation of the Alabama coast the next morning. So we knew traffic would be awful. So the debate began on when to leave (tonight or early the next morning). So we went up around 6:30. This also allowed us to get some tuna dip at the bar for dinner.
We opted to leave around 4 this next morning. So we came up, ate, showered, packed, and went to bed. We ended up heading out at 5, and we made it home around 1. This included a breakfast stop, two gas station stops, and then lunch on the way in. It was a long drive, but we survived it!
Overall it was a really nice getaway. Food was difficult to say the least, and the beach was far more crowded than we wanted. But we did get to have some amazing seafood, and we had a fun vacation just the three of us. I do hope for a day we can go back and things be normal again, but this satisfied us for now.
