Sunday Swim Day

I found a lake for us to visit today.  Our usual "swmming hole" was not available as they have a sporting event there this weekend and it is thus closed to general swimming.  I was at a bit of a loss.  I did not want to drive over an hour of highway driving in near century temps to get to an ocean beach.  The local state forest beach is not a good fit for our family.  The way they rope their swimming areas the deep end is not acessable from the shallow end and thus I can't effectively life guard  my deep water swimmer(s) while watching the littles in the shallow end.  Also the beach is small and the number of people in the water is a bit of a challenge for Chet.  I had despaired of much beyond a slip and slide in our back yard when I remembered a lake in a nearby state.  It is less than an hour from us and we were on the road pretty quickly once I checked it out on line. They would allow food, my swim vests (some places don't!) and the cost would only be $10 to admit us for the day.  I had lunch packed and the car loaded and we were on the road before 10:30  As I drove through town, it read 97 degrees then.  Oy!

It was beautiful at the lake though.  It was significantly cooler--about 10 degrees or more.  The lake is very large and the roped swimming area is equally large.  So people were spread out and this was optimal for Chet.  Also there were fresh water snail shells to gather. Chet will spend literally the entire time you bring him to the beach gathering shells.  He stopped for lunch and that was it.  His intense fixation on this is baffling to KC.  He wants Chet to feel included.  He spent some time helping him look for shells but 5 1/2 hours of shell gathering was not something he wanted to do. He kept trying to call Chet over to us where we were playing in the water and could not understand his lack of interest in that.

The littles and I played water frisbee, mother may I (the "water version!" which truly must be seen to be believed!) water tag and just goofed around.  Finally about 3:10 or so it started to sprinkle a bit and I called it a day.  On the way home I stopped and bought them all a cone, not knowing today was National Ice Cream Day!  It was a great end to the weekend and a great summer memory to treasure in January when winter winds will howl!