The trip started off fine. We started off early enough to beat the stand still of Atlanta rush hour traffic and made pretty good time to our destination of Myrtle Beach. It was June of 2010, and we were going to enjoy a family vacation in a place none of us had ever visited before. Little did we know just what we were in for.
We arrived at the resort in a thunderstorm and had to wait a little while for our condo to be ready. After a 2 hour wait, we could finally get in our rooms to relax while we waited on the storm to pass. We went and sat on our balcony, watching the waves crash onto the shore. Suddenly, right off the beach at our resort, a water spout developed. When you have never had seen one of those, and lived in a place called Tornado Alley, all you could imagine was it coming on shore and blowing everything away. We later found out that there were 3 more on the other side of the resort that we could not see. This was our welcome on our first day.
On our second day, we discovered that the resort had karaoke every afternoon next to the pool. The kids all love singing, so we headed down there to let them sing and have fun. There were flood lights that came on at night to shine on the flag they flew in the courtyard where the karaoke took place. They were supposed to only come on at night, but one had a short in it and was staying on all the time. My granddaughter brushed her hand against it and received a third degree burn. Day two didn’t turn out so well either.
Our third day started out great. We played in the ocean and relaxed at the water park on the resort grounds. The men went and played a round of golf. Everyone was going out that evening and, as we were getting ready, we heard fire alarms. There was a fire in a condo two floors below us. We had to evacuate the building. Thankfully, no one was hurt and the fire did not spread. We all went out later and one of the family got bumped by a car while he was crossing the street. He just got a little bruised from this. So ended day three.
Day four, when we got up, everyone was talking about how they did not sleep well because it was so hot in the condo. We checked the thermostat and it was set at 72 degrees but the thermometer said that it was 80 degrees in the condo. We call the front desk 3 times before someone comes to check. They change the filter and leave. The temperature still does not go down, so we call again. And again. They finally send someone back the next day and we are told that it cannot be repaired. We have to pack up and move to another condo. So, day four and five kept our bad luck streak alive.
We did get to enjoy the next two days with no fire, flood or injury. We even got one night’s stay free because of the trouble we had with the air conditioning. We returned to the same resort this year for our vacation and only had one mishap with a jelly fish.
So, 2010 was the year of the vacation we will never forget. We did get to spend time together as a family. And on the way home, we got stopped for speeding.