I never thought I’d go to Myrtle Beach on a trip. It’s just not someplace I’ve thought to go to for vacation. But I got an invitation in the mail from IHG and I wanted to take the kids somewhere warm, so I thought I’d give it a try. It worked out! We ended up having a great time.
So, the drive was a little bit long–really long, actually. It ended up taking 12 hours to get there, but we had fun driving both ways. I made sure that I packed lots of good Trader Joes snacks and lunch-type food. The first place we stopped for gas, in West Virginia, we made a picnic lunch. It was just nice to get away. Anyway, we finally landed in Myrtle Beach at 9:00 p.m. and our hotel was perfect. It was right on the ocean and the lobby was beautiful. It overlooked the ocean with huge windows and the furniture and light fixtures were modern, beachy, and made us feel like we were on a nice spring trip in a warm locale.
So, the first day we were there, I had to sneak away to listen to a timeshare presentation in the morning. They paired me with a single Italian mom from the east coast, which I thought was pretty funny. She was lovely and took me on a tour of what a time share condo looked like and the grounds. It was very nice, but I wasn’t interested. They did give me points toward a free night’s stay and they didn’t pressure me, so it was fine. I walked back and the kids had just gotten up for the day. Next, we all headed to the beach. All we had to do was take the elevator down to the first floor and the beach was right there. So nice. We laid our towels out and truly just soaked in the sun for a good half hour. It was a really hot day, so we all immediately got burned. But we couldn’t help enjoying that warm weather. Next, Josie asked me if I wanted to jump the waves. I can’t tell you again how relaxing it was to be in the water with Josie on that warm day, listening to the ocean, letting the waves pick us up like the best kind of old school, mellow roller coaster ride. We were having so much fun, Isaac and Joey joined us. It was one of my favorite moments on the trip.
Next, Josie and I wandered over to the pool that we could see from our balcony. There was an indoor pool, a baby pool and a lazy river. Josie immediately made a few friends and I laid on my recliner and enjoyed my book for the remainder of the afternoon. The boys headed to the gym and enjoyed the beach–it was so nice to have so many options at one place. That night, we stopped by Walmart and picked up boogie boards, so the kids could enjoy the waves a different way. They immediately wanted to test them, so we went back to the beach. It was such a fun thing to watch my kids having a good time. It’s what made the drive worthwhile.
The next day, it poured rain all day. I mean poured buckets of rain from morning until night and never let up the entire time. So, I looked up things to do around Myrtle Beach and found a couple of cute little beach towns. We drove through one and looked at the cute houses and then we found a pretty little outdoor shopping center that looked like a little village. They had Easter Eggs filled with candy for the kids to collect at each store and we just walked around and looked at all the little shops. When we got back, we headed to the lounge to order lots of yummy fried appetizers and play chess while looking at the ocean on that rainy day. Isaac played each of us and beat all of us. He’s such a chess player.That night, we went to the best pizza shop, in our opinion. It was packed with people, which is always a good sign. They had a display case filled with cannolis and all kinds of delicious looking desserts. After we had our pizza, we split a cannoli covered in chocolate chips and it was perfect. We couldn’t have asked for a better Easter dinner.
This was a short trip, but it was a good one. The fact that we could take an elevator to the beach was my favorite part. The hotel was lovely and had several pools, corn hole, ping pong, and board games. There was plenty of family fun at the hotel and being so close to the beach was the best part. Spring break 2023 was a success!
