Our vacation schedule was pretty relaxed on our Outer Banks trip. With the ocean and a pool right at our doorstep, the "plan" if you really call it that, was just to enjoy it all. We did, however have a few special things in our back pocket.
On Tuesday morning, Jason, his Dad and Josh and I were up at the crack of dawn to go and meet Captain Justin from Corolla Bait & Tackle for a morning of fishing on the sound. Jason had worked with them to plan a trip that would be a fun way to show Joshua what kind of fishing can be done around the ocean and the sound, since all he has seen so far has been lake and stream fishing locally. We weren't really sure what to expect, but were all very pleasantly surprised about how much fun we had with Justin on the pontoon boat. It rained a bit while we were out, but it didn't matter to us.
We all ended up with fish on our line- some more impressive than others. Justin set up 6-7 rods so that we each had one we were fishing with, and gave us instructions on what to do when we heard the reel start to "sing". We were fishing with pieces of small fish (I don't recall what kind) and also squid depending on the area we were in and what we were trying to catch.
Jason was the first one to get something on the hook, and he landed a stingray! Very cool. We quickly got him back into the water and hoped to catch something a little prettier than the stingray.
Josh was next. Justin got very excited and told Joshua to just keep reeling hard to bring whatever was on his line into the boat. And Josh did just that. He didn't give up and kept fighting with the fish until he had it on the edge of the boat for Justin to scoop up in his net. Josh was so proud. We grabbed a few quick pictures and then sent our little spotted gar friend back into the waters to join his friends.
Justin had some crab pots soaking in the water overnight and told us that if we liked blue crab, we could check to see if he had caught any. Joshua loved pulling the crab pots out of the water and helping to shake out the crabs. We proudly brought them back to the house and planned to cook them up for supper. Jason was especially ready to throw them into the boiling water after one clamped onto his finger and wasn't interested in letting go when we got them back to the house.
The shellfish eating decision was a tricky one for us. Ever since Joshua was diagnosed with his allergy issues at 2, we were told to avoid shellfish because of the close correlation of peanut and shellfish allergies. But Joshua was so excited to try the crab that he pulled out of the water with his own two hands, and neither Jason or I had the heart to tell him he couldn't. So we said a prayer and had one hand on the Auvi-Q while he ate it. Thankfully there were no issues.
(Nice that I made it into at least one picture on this trip, right? I'm not joking, this is one of a very few!)
Wednesday evening, we ventured out for supper to a restaurant called Fat Crabs. What an experience that was. It looked questionable upon entering, but turned out to be a fantastic meal! It was a cross between a crab shack/seafood place and a Carolina BBQ joint. You had to serve your own drinks, and there was not one single thing fancy about this place. But it was one of our favorite stops on the trip. We will definitely return.
After we ate, we took a drive to the Currituck Lighthouse and walked around there a bit. We even found Mara a playground. That girl asked no less than 1000 times a day to play on the playground, so we HAD to find one somewhere. Luckily a quick stop appeased her until the following morning at least.
One more beach post coming!
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