North Shore Beach

After realizing that Jed had never been to a beach before, we decided that such a situation must be immediately remedied. So we went to a North Shore beach on Cape Ann on a recommendation from a friend, and it was perfect.

It was supposed to be a super-hot day, but we left the house in the middle of a thunderstorm. Halfway there it stopped raining. Unfortunately it took us twice as long to get there as it should have; construction on one major road and a huge accident that closed down another. Once we finally crawled our way to the beach, we paid our parking fee and walked (sloooowly with Jed) down to the dunes.

Jed was not very sure about it all. But after we'd pitched our cooler and sunscreened up we headed to the water, and then he was sold. This beach is only about 3 feet deep for half a mile, so the water warms up (!) nicely, and you don't have to worry about your kids being over their head unless they tip over.

The bottom has lots of tiny sand dollars. Jed got really good at spotting them, and we collected a few, along with some snails, in our buckets for a short walk. Then we hiked out to a sand bar, and Jim dug jumping pools while Jed reinvented the eternal game of "waves got your toes". Then we investigated the big rocks on one area of the shore, which were covered with interesting seaweed in parts and had small tidepools on the others. Gus said, "Mommy, this was a good idea!" Jed said, "Mommy! Beach! FUN!"

After climbing the rocks we bought a very reasonable lunch from the nearby chow hut, and then the kids spent a couple more hours making a series of castles that were overrun by the incoming tide.

We changed the kiddos and handed them a snack. Jed fell asleep mid-pretzel. We stopped by a farm on the way back and Gus and I went to pick blueberries. "Mommy, this was a good idea too. I like all your ideas!"

Thanks for the recommendation, chica, for our new beach spot!