nathan jara

Summer vacation this year afforded me the opportunity to travel to the sunny shores of Corolla, located in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Vacationing with family, both immediate and extended, provided for a great week of visiting, eating, napping, sunning, reading, sanding, ocean-ing, and general beach bumming. Corolla and the Outer Banks are a beautiful part of the Atlantic shoreline. The beach has certainly become my favorite vacation spot, well, except for maybe that time I went to Italy ; )

In addition to lots of time with my feet in the sand, we stopped in Williamsburg, Virginia and visited the Colonial Williamsburg area. I was able to take a stroll through the colonial town and really enjoyed seeing a glimpse into the rich heritage of our American ancestors. It’s amazing how times have changed. Another exciting aspect for me during the trip was it gave me a great excuse to use my new digital SLR camera, a Canon Rebel T3i. The camera was a ton of fun to play with, hence the pictures below. Check out more of my photos from the beach and Williamsburg on Picasa.

Sand dunes of Corolla

Dragonfly

Ocean evening

Colonial Williamsburg

Vacation. Yes, vacation. This past week I was on vacation. And a glorious one it was. A handful of my best friends and I travelled to the Outer Banks in North Carolina for a week of sand, sun and fun. It was my first time in the Outer Banks and I had a blast. Renting a house near the beach I spent the majority of my time making the tough decisions in life, such as, should I read some more of my book? maybe have a snack? boogie-boarding? no, I think it might be time for a nap. These were the most frequent dilemmas I faced while taking in the bright sun and ocean breeze. North Carolina is a beautiful area. Mostly just beach, beach, and more beach, which was fine with me. I was able to relax, de-stress, and not think about work once. I also indulged in some fantastic meals prepared by my 5-star chef friends :)

We enjoyed five picture perfect days at the beach … until … he came. Yes, the hurricane named Earl. He swept in andpushed us off the beach two days before we were ready. It was an interesting experience really. I’ve never been affected this much by weather, growing up in Pennsylvania. We found ourselves glued to The Weather Channel several times during the week and were finally forced to evacuate Thursday morning before the storm hit that night. What a bummer. I admit that I did fall into a beach depression for some time, but we ventured forward determined not to let Earl get the best of us.

Leaving the Outer Banks, we spent some time in the Washington D.C. area and visited Georgetown for an evening. The following day we turned our vegetable-like vacation into an educational one and drove to Mount Vernon, the old home of the original “G Dubya.” We took a tour of George Washington’s old mansion and walked some of his enormous estate. I tried to place myself back in that time period and was amazed to think how much life has changed since Washington was the man of the hour. From Mount Vernon, we continued our hop up the east coast and made a final stop at the Inner Harbor area of Baltimore, Maryland. A good dinner and beach reminiscing at the local Hard Rock Cafe prepared us for our final trip back home to the ‘burgh. While I’m still not giving up my grudge against Earl, I had an awesome time this past week. It was a trip I’ll never forget; a gratuitous amount of fun, really ;)