Pre-Deployment Leave

Four years (and 11 days ago) I posted my very first entry on this blog. Hard to believe I am writing almost an identical entry four years and two weeks or so in the future.

As you may remember from my last entry Ryan took Rylie down to South Carolina to see his family for the first half of his leave while I worked. While he was there my parents drove down to pick Rylie up and they kept her so we could go to Myrtle Beach for the second half of Ryan's leave. We basically had a repeat of our vacation from two years ago with a few minor differences... but we even stayed in the same hotel!

The week was spent sunning on the beach, avoiding afternoon thunderstorms, staying up late (usually drinking), meeting awesome people, and eating really good food! Our hotel had an outdoor beach bar the was open until 11 every night with live music, an indoor club that was open until 2am, and a bar down the street that was open later on certain nights. My poor liver went into shock!

We ate at some amazing restaurants, RIOZ and the Flying Fish are two I highly recommend. Now they are pricey, but worth it for a big night out. RIOZ is a churascurria, a Brazilian restaurant that basically carries big slabs of meat around to your table and slices them as you request them. Plus they had a huge salad bar (I got to try quail eggs!), side dishes and a heavenly dessert cart. The Flying Fish had delicious seafood and was worth the hour wait we had.

There was one night we opted to bar hop and then we met some people from our hotel that invited us to hang out once the bar closed. We played drinking games and talked until it turned gray outside. Ryan and I headed back to our room but then as I laid my weary old head down to finally sleep Ryan decided he wanted to go on the beach and watch the sunrise. Now, once my husband gets an idea in his head it is pretty hard to break him of it... when he is drunk it is impossible. Hence the reason I found myself watching a sunrise on the beach in my pajama shirt and sweatpants with my husband in my sweatshirt with all the morning joggers and shell collectors. We obviously were the only ones who had not yet gone to sleep! It was beautiful though and I am glad he forced me down there.

We also went back to the Boardwalk to play arcade games and spent time at Broadway at the Beach. Our newest favorite find was the mirror maze. It was so fun! For a decent price you can go through as many times as you want until closing. I am not lying when I say we did it at least a dozen times. We also had these trippy beer goggle-esque glasses that they gave us which made it even more difficult. We went through with the glasses, without them, forwards, backwards, starting from separate ends and racing... it was a blast. The employees liked us so they walked us through the "quick" way and showed us the mirrors that are actually doors (for emergencies and the break room, important!). We caught some fireworks and had a blast.

Even though we've done the Myrtle Beach thing before I didn't mind doing it again since Ryan really wanted to go. Our next trip anywhere should be international and post deployment, so I am really looking forward to that for many reasons. Thanks for sticking around with my lack of posting... just trying to spend as much time with my husband as I can!