Cape Cod Beaches Revealed

Back at camp, we found that things were wet, for sure, but nothing we couldn’t air out today. We put everything out to dry, and then we went to the beach.

The Cape Cod bayside beach is not exactly Lake Michigan. We paid $15 just to park at the city beach, and we then walked past the parking lot port-a-potty and onto a small patch of beach, crowded with people from all over the world. We set up our chairs and spread out our towels and sent the kids to the water.

This didn’t work so well, as the sand was covered with seaweed that wrapped around their ankles, and it felt slimy as they stepped through. They were not impressed. We were a bit surprised that Cape Cod gets so much press, when it is clear that Lake Michigan is better swimming. Not to mention that the whole shark thing still had Allison shaking. We found out this morning that there was a shark attack on Cape Cod 2 days ago, but we did our best to distract her from figuring out what we were talking about.

We persevered, practically forcing them to “enjoy” the beach for a little while. Then something happened. The tide went out, and over the course of the 5 hours we were there, the beach grew about 3 times its size, and people scrambled into the water to chase down crabs and walk the clean sandy ocean floor that was beyond the seaweed. The rocks started to emerge and grow, and the marsh grasses poked their heads out of the water and blossomed into big patches of green waving over shallow water.

By the time we’d hit low tide, you could see sand bars far out into the water, and people were just strolling through the ocean. Natalie and Allison fished shells out of the marsh grasses, and Andrew explored the far sand bars. Truly an amazing transformation to behold.

And, it turns out, the weedy stuff all over the beach and the cloudy water were very unusual. All due to the storm last night (did I mention in my previous post that it rained a bit?). We had a wonderful day and went back to the campground for a pasta dinner and some zucchini cake that Natalie made before we left home. Later on, we’ll be having the first campfire of the trip and a round of smores, followed by a night in a mostly dry tent. Happy Wednesday to you!

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