A U.E.

Or Unplanned Event as my grandpa calls them. He says you can't take a vacation without one. I concur. Here's a doozie...

While we were in Pismo we decided to go play on their famous sand dunes. So we head out to the beach. You stop at this booth where you pay $5 and the CA Parks Dept. people tell you to drive your car out onto the sand. Yes, drive your car out onto the sand! Oh, and stay on the hard packed sand they say. At this point it was a good thing my dad was driving my van because I never would have done it - way too chicken! And if Chris had been with us, we never would have done it - way too careful! But hey grandpa, he's up for adventure so onto the sand we drive.
Freaky is all I have to say. Maybe if you don't own the car it's cool, but for me it was freaky. Here we are following my aunt and uncle and then parked on the beach at the dunes.

So we had a rolicking good time at the dunes. We rolled, we summersaulted, we layed. We also ate it, got it stuck in our eyes and had it in every revice but hey!



And then we headed back. And then we got stuck.
Super stuck. We were not going anywhere!! What they hadn't warned us about when we paid our $5 was that the tide was going to come in. I'm not a beach bum, I didn't think about that!!! So on the way back to the road there was almost no hard packed sand left, the water had covered it all. So as my dad explained it his choice was water or the soft sand and the soft sand seemed the safest option. Ok, I definitely agreed with him there. So what to do? We're standing around deciding if we should try to dig, or if we should ask a passerby for help. We're laughing a lot and I'm freaking out a bit. And then a Parks Dept. truck pulls up. The lady turns out to be soooooo nice, but she rushes up to us and says, you know that the tide will be past your car in 40 minutes right?! WHAT!!! WHAT???!!!! WHAT??!! We have less than 30 minutes to get it moved or it will be floating out to sea. (And yes, she said it happens every week. Really?! Really??) Anyway, Holy Crap! So all of our slight panic turns into major panic and we call the tow number she gave us. She assured us they could be there in 5 minutes but 25 (horrific) minutes later they finally arrive.
I didn't get a good shot of the water, but it was under the back wheel by the time they got there and got us hooked up:


So while we were waiting, these two other cars got stuck too.

And these local punks were taking bets on who was going to wash out to sea first. I guess that's what you do for fun on a chilly Friday if you're from Pismo beach. :-)
The view from the van as the tow is pulling us to safety.

The relief on my face as they did so!!
Thanks for such an eventful vacation dad!!!