Gulf Shores Trip Day Six- Our Last Day

This was our last day at the beach down in Gulf Shores, Alabama. The rains and storms cleared out and left us with some hot sunny weather and some big waves. I figured the kids would be scared of the ocean waves, but after they watched Justin and I do some boogie boarding they were ready to jump right in!

Here are some pics of just playing on the beach and at the pool for our last day of vacation. We did do some fishing, but didnt do any catching in the short amount of time we devoted to God's favorite pasttime. (it's fishing for those of you who arent religious).

We finished off the evening with some pizza delivery from Cricco's and the movie How to Train Your Dragon from the local Red Box. Noah was so exhausted from the day, he actually fell asleep and tumbled over onto the couch while still chewing on a bite of pizza in the middle of a sentence explaining how tired he was. I havent seen that before, it was like someone hit him with one of those animal stun darts.

Anyhow that was our first time using red box movie rental and it worked out pretty slick for just $1. We actually returned it to the red box in Morton on our way home after watching it during the car ride home.

So we headed for home at 3 am on Tuesday morning and made it back to Peoria at 4:45 pm. It was a long day of traveling, but overall the kids did great. About noon my dad texts me over this picture:

They went fishing at the Gulf Shores State Pier and caught 2 sharks, 15 big croakers, 10 ground mullet, a sting ray, that big redfish, and had 6 fish break their lines. We actually barely ever fish the pier, but since they completely renovate the pier after the last hurricane it has been dynamite fishing! We will be more prepared for Pier fishing on our next visit!

So to wrap up this trip, we stayed at Lani Kai Village Condos right on the beach in Gulf Shores. All the condos through Meyer Realty are half price due to the oil spill scaring away all the vacationers. We fished at the little lagoon pass, perdido bridge pass, the gulf shores state pier, and right off the beach in front of the condo. The pier costs $8 to fish from, but everywhere else was free. Just toss shrimp or pinfish out into the water and hold onto your pole! Our favorite place to eat is Bahama Bobs beachside cafe just a short walk down the beach from the condo (you dont need to go anywhere else for the islands best food). The girls made a few visits to the Tanger Outlet Mall and the only other attraction we went to was the Gulf Shores Zoo. The whole 6 day trip for our family of five including condo rental, gas, food, bait, license, zoo, and kayak rental costed about $950.

Fellas, the one thing that does not include was shopping at the outlet mall and souvenir city. I can't really count them as fixed costs into the vacation budget if I dont have a clue how many hours I worked in exchange for those new clothes and fancy smooth souvenir rocks, I would more classify them as a cost of living expense......