Cape San Blas - Great Family Beach

by Wheeler Family
(Paragould, Arkansas)

Let me set the stage for this, maybe you can relate. When I experience something bad, I write about it. When my experience is good, I write even more.

I travel a lot for work. It takes me all over the country many times and I don't get nearly enough time with my family at home. I do get sporadic weeks off as well but we can't plan to go anywhere on the short notice that I have before getting time off.

My wife is the most loyal woman in the world. She never complains when our vacations are at home even though she'd truly love to get out and go somewhere. The same could be said about the kids, 12 yo girl and 14 yo boy.

This past summer I made it a point to book us all a real family vacation and it was at Cape San Blas, Florida, for the fact that it's so quiet and basically deserted. It's not cheap mind you, but consider it an investment and go.

I had the greatest time with all of my family and just as important, they did too! For the first time in many years we all had fun as a family together. It's rare in our family. Most of the time the kids disappear into their own directions or want go to tourist things, which is fine but it's not the quality time that my wife and I would like.

It's completely different San Blas. Yes, you *can* go and do things in the area but it's perfectly enjoyable if you just stay on the beach, or even lounge around the condo!

So for the most of the week we were truly together most of the day and the night. For many that sounds like a nightmare. For us this was a renewal.

We even brought the dog and his doggy bed. It was as family friendly as I could imagine.

Our rental was not directly on the beach but not too far away, which was fine. There was another family set up a ways away down the beach but not at all crowded.

We got unpacked and everyone was excited to get out to the beach. None more excited that Roger, our dog.

I trained him to come back to me when I blow a special whistle. He waits for permission from me and then runs. He honestly doesn't get to run much nowdays so as we got set up on the beach I let him run almost out of site.

Wow, he was tearing around.

With a blow of the whistle, he comes right back. Great dog or great training, I'm not sure.

On the way down I promoted the whole week by telling everyone how much fun I can be. I got the skeptical look from nearly everyone, which doesn't surprise me.

Once we got set up, we all went out into the water. My wife's not a great swimmer so she rode the tube with me swimming it around and the kids having their own. That was so much fun and yet such a simple thing! We'd swim out on the tubes and play around for hours at a time. The sun was bright but not hot and the water was comfortable.

In between we'd eat all together and talk like an old style family. Do you remember when that was common?

And the sunsets were fantastic! Sure, I think it's nice to look at but my wife thought the whole scene was very romantic. We would sit together and watch the colors of sky and the sunset. Pretty hard to beat.

There's still more that'd I could add but let me just cut it off and say, go there. If you are looking for a family vacation, bring the wife, the kids and the dog and be the hero in your family. Go to Cape San Blas.