Vacation Day 1 - Saturday June 13

Saturday, June 13.  Emily had her "Red/Black" swim meet Saturday morning.  I woke up sneezing and with watery eyes.  Should be a fun day.  I ended up being a volunteer timer for the meet, which started at 8am and finished around 10:30am. 

We couldn't check into the hotel until 4, so we had plenty of time and no rush to pack up the truck for a week.  When you stay in a condo, you pack a lot more stuff.  Food, games, etc.  For me and Adrienne, Emily, and Adrienne's step-sister Erin, we took an amazing amount of stuff.  The bed of my pickup was pretty much full.

We finally took off around 1:30.  It's about a 2.5 hour drive to the Fairfield Harbour Resort in New Bern.  About an hour and a half in, I had to give up driving because the sneezing and watery eyes were just killing me.  I took a couple of benedryl and let Adrienne drive the rest of the way.

The benedryl didn't help, so when we got checked into the resort and unpacked into our super cool condo, I went back up the road a couple miles to a gas station and bought some Nyquil, then ordered some pizza for carryout at the Big Apple Pizzeria across the street from the gas station.  Nyquil is the only cold med I trust.  After eating some pizza, I went up to the bedroom and crashed.  It was only 8 o'clock.

The resort we were staying at was the "Wyndham Vacation Resort at Fairfield Harbour".  It's one of their older resorts - built in the 60s and 70s I'd guess from the architecture.  We had two units, one of which wee would not check into until Sunday.  The second unit was for Adrienne's sister's family, and her dad and step-mom.  But the unit we checked into on Saturday was located in the "Sandcastle II" part of the resort.  These were attached townhome style units that had recently been remodeled.

When you walk in the front door, there is a foyer and half bath, then up half a flight of stairs into the dining room, along with the full kitchen, living room, and exit to the "front porch" - the units surround a large pond, with a walkway around the pond and a few docks for fishing and such.  We had a beautiful view of the "lake".   From the dining room, up another half flight of stairs to a laundry-room which doubled as a jacuzzi tub room, and also the "master" bedroom - a double bed, desk, and full bathroom.  Up another half flight of stairs to the second bedroom and another smaller full bath, and then up another flight of stairs to a loft-style third bedroom with 2 twin beds.

About a 5 minute walk from this unit was the marina and the recreation center.  This was not really a public marina, but more a place to rent boat slips.  There was a restaurant at the marina, but no store or anything, so it wasn't the kind of marina where people would dock temporarily to load up on supplies, use the bathrooms, or anything like that.  There were a lot of big boats though, probably 80-90% of them sailboats of 30-40 feeet.  The restaurant, which we ate at twice, was not great but was decent.  Okay, we actually got carryout and took it back to the unit twice.

The rec center had a mini-golf course, indoor and ourdoor pools, tennis courts, and playground.  Amazingly, I didn't use the pool once.  I think Erin took Emily to the pool once. 

That's about all I have for "Day 1".  More to come!