It's been a while since we went camping, and probably for the first time ever, Josh had the entire Memorial Day Weekend off. So we packed up all our gear, our new tent and Smudge and headed out toward the ocean to the Asseteague Island/ Ocean City, MD area. The drive was supposed to take about three hours, but because it it was Friday afternoon or Memorial Day Weekend, it actually ended up taking almost five!
We got to cross the Bay bridge, which was really neat. It is probably the tallest bridge I have ever been on and we could see the ships and barges coming from miles away.
Because the drive took so long, we were hungry and we knew if we waited until we got to our camp site and got the tent set up and built a fire we would be starving and too tired to eat anyway, so we stopped in the cutest little town, Trappe, at Talbot Smokehouse. This is a super random restaurant for such a small town. It looks like it should be in Chelsea in NYC. I got the pork belly and sweet potato hash. Delicious!
We finished up the drive, and someone was getting very excited for it to be over.
We arrived to our very busy campground and got all checked in. We stayed at Frontier town, like the coolest family oriented campground I have ever seen. Even though it was really geared toward kids and family, it was so much fun! there is a water park with a lazy river and waterslides, an awesome mini golf course, wild west shows, hayrides and lots of kid activities.
We got the tent set up rather quickly, especially since it was our first time. It's pretty awesome. And huge.
I managed to get some pictures before the sun went down too.
We went to bed pretty early, sadly our neighbors were up partying until 1:30am and then somehow up again at 4:30 being very loud again so we got like no sleep. Not impressed but it's always a risk when tenting! So we were up crazy early, and decided to take a little walk around the campground. It is such a pretty area, right on the water. Assateague is known mostly for the wild horses that roam the island but also for the many bird species that are inhabitants and we saw a ton of them!
Smudge got the hang of the camping thing pretty quickly!
Since the weather was supposed to be the best on Saturday we thought we would explore the island a little bit. There are some cool boardwalks and amazing beaches.
We also got to see some wild horses right off the bat. They were just hanging out on the side of the road on our drive across the bridge to the island.
When we went to the beach we saw more wild horses. I was hoping that I would get a majestic picture of them running down the bean or something, but instead they were standing in front of the beach bathroom. I guess beggers can't be choosers!
Like I said, the beaches here are beautiful with the white sand dunes leading down to the water. Unfortunately, the water is more like Maine temperature than Florida. Very beautiful though!
After the beach we went for another walk inland over the marshes to look for more horses. We didn't see anymore hires but we did see a whole herd of turtles on the shore!
We stopped in at the visitor center to look for souvenirs and find out more about the area. It had some really cool displays and artifacts like this huge anchor that was found in the area and some sea creatures like a seahorse.
After a few hours on the island we were going back and who did we see holding up traffic but those horses from earlier. The one in front of the cars totally knew what he was doing too. So funny!
We stopped for a seafood lunch and some Crushes (really good vodka drinks that are huge in the area). I got the soft shell crab tacos. I LOVE soft shell crab so much.
On our way back into the campground we had to play some mini golf. Josh and I have a huge mini golf rivalry, and I kicked his butt.
We got back to the campsite floes to dark and got the fire going and bush pies built. If you have never had bush pies you are missing out! They are my camping staple. We went and bought a double cast iron Bush Pie maker and I decided we would do pizza ones for this meal. It is just white bread (well white bread is the best) with any fill-in inside. Like I said I did pizza ones with cheese, pizza sauce and pepperoni but we also did breakfast ones the next morning with egg and sausage and again for dinner with a burger and cheese inside. Dessert ones filled with pie filling are also awesome.
We actually got a good night's sleep, other than being up stupidly early. the weather forecast was not grey for the day and it was insanely foggy first thing in the morning and actually most of the day.
Once we were all showered and ready to go, we went into Ocean City. This is a famous beach town similar to like Seaside Heights in New Jersey, Atlantic City, or any other touristy area in America. I feel like once you have seen one you have seen them all. Still it was cool to check out. We got some souvenirs and walked the boardwalk and had some ice cream.
The waves here are huge and it is well known for it's good surfing.
the pier has a ferris wheel and carnival games etc. The beach is crazy huge and beautiful here too.
After a couple hours of wandering here we decided to check out a lunch place we had seen online, Hooper's Crab House. It was away from the touristy area and a massive restaurant with a little pier restaurant and their own brewery, Fin City Brewery. After deciding on a few things on the menu, the waitress told us about the "All you can eat" option. All you can eat crabs, hush puppies, corn on the cob, fried chicken and steamed shrimp. We were sold. And by the time we left we were in a coma.
We really just wanted to go back to the campsite and have a nap, but Josh needed a rematch at mini-golf. He beat me this time, but barely.
As we got back to the site it started to rain a bit, so we did end up having our nap and a late dinner of burger bush pies that we weren't really hungry for. We spent the evening hanging out by the fire which was lovely. There weren't really even any bugs there which is always a bonus. We went to bed knowing we would wake up to rain, as Tropical Storm Bonnie was going to be hitting.
We woke up at about 3am to the craziest downpour/ Poor Smudge was freaking out because it literally sounded like we were under a faucet. We checked the radar and saw that at about 5:30 we might get a lull in the storm. Sure enough it slowed down a bit around 5:30, enough to get packed up anyway. We were literally floating on a lake!
We actually ended up getting home around 10am. It was sad that we missed a whole day there but it was nice to get home and cuddle up on the couch!
Looks like a fun time!
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