The hardest part of quarantine has definitely been not being able to see my friends. We’ve been trying to FaceTime almost every day (and we usually do, for hours on end), but it’s nowhere near the same as being able to be all together in-person. Thankfully, we were all able to plan a trip to the beach together, and it was the most perfect trip I could possibly ask for.
On our departing morning, my two guy friends who live close-ish to my area met me at my house. From there, we all packed up the car (with plenty of snacks of course), and headed onto the road. A few hours and one Wawa pit stop later, we made it to our beachfront townhouse rental, where my best friend Jamie was already waiting for us to arrive. I hadn’t seen Jamie in almost a year, and I hadn’t seen Jacob in a little over four months, so it was the sweetest reunion.
When I say our townhouse was right on the beach, I mean RIGHT on the beach. When we stepped onto the balcony/patio on the first floor, we could see the ocean with only the obstruction of a sand dune, which had a path carved out for us to cross straight onto the beach itself. After exchanging hugs and giving Jamie her Christmas and graduation presents, we all changed and headed out to the beach for about an hour. It may have been a short period of time, but we spent the whole hour jumping and dodging waves and splashing each other. We played Cards Against Humanity while drying off, then changed for dinner and a photoshoot. It did rain for a little bit that night, but we passed the time by filming a Taste Test Kitchen video, which will be coming soon to Terrifically Toni. We stayed up to a little past midnight watching Disney+ and simply enjoying each other’s company.
I woke up quite a bit earlier than the rest of the group, so I spent the first part of my morning on the patio taking some pictures and going through my phone notifications. Once everyone else woke up and came downstairs, we enjoyed breakfast together before spending quite a few hours on the beach. Like the day before, we spent most of our time in the water together. We came in for a lunch and snack break, which ended up lasting considerably longer than we originally thought. Later that night, we got changed into coordinating blue outfits, and took group pictures at sunset, as well as pictures for Jamie’s high school graduation. That night, we ended up playing Sobriety Test, a quite fun and family-friendly party game that involves completing various chaotic prompts, before watching some episodes of Milo Murphy’s law, which was recommended by Caleb.
The third morning was quite similar to the second, except considerably more overcast. We ate our breakfast and spent a little time on the beach (yes, we dug a hole in the sand) before packing it in for a passing rain storm. Jamie pulled out her Cards Against Humanity again to pass some time. Once the storm passed, we all ran back out to the beach. That night, we took our last set of pictures, and exchanged more hugs as we watched Lilo and Stitch on the living room TV.
The final morning was tear-filled, mostly by me. It was our final morning all together. We ate breakfast together, finished packing, and took one last stroll to the beach before saying goodbye to Jamie. Jacob, Caleb, and I visited a nearby beach with a driving path. The three of us requested Chick-fil-a for our final meal on the road. Again, we listened to our crazy long Spotify playlists on the way home. We met Jacob and Caleb’s families at a local Shake Shack, where we all had one last meal together before going our separate ways.
This trip was easily the highlight of my summer. I always love traveling, and spending time with my friends, so putting the two of them together was a dream come true. It was the perfect trip, as we were isolated the entire time. At several points throughout the trip, I completely forgot about any stress, anxiety, or problems I’ve had. I was simply happy- a feeling I hadn’t come close to fully and truly feeling since spring break. As I work on going through all the pictures and videos I took, I am filled with happy memories, ones that I know will last me a lifetime. I might be at home working again, but it was not a goodbye, just a goodbye for now. I’ll be seeing Jacob and Caleb when I go back to college in about a month, and I’m trying to make plans with Jamie for our winter break. In the meantime, I will be posting all of the vlogs from this trip on my YouTube channel, Terrifically Toni, and I’ll be sharing tons of pictures on my Instagram (@pinkdaysblog), so be sure to check out my other pages!
See ya real soon,