Vacation Day 1 - Wilmington NC

We finally found a few days to get away (over Memorial Day weekend) and Lorne asked me where I wanted to go. I chose Wilmington NC because my grandma used to live there before she died (I just found out she died a year and a half ago - no one bothered to call). We left Friday afternoon (5/23) and checked into the hotel around 11:30 PM. We used Lorne's Hilton points to stay at the Hampton Inn for free while we were there and Lorne even managed to get us a suite by sweet talking the receptionist! They are very friendly in the South and I really enjoyed my stay there! There was a sweet old lady that helped man the breakfast in the morning and she paid special attention to Jasmine all the mornings we were there.
On our first day, the weather forcast wasn't looking good so we decided to do a few touristy things that didn't require being in swimsuits and possibly getting rained on. The first thing we did was take an hour long trolley ride through the streets of Downtown/Old Town Wilmington. Did you know that Wilmington NC was where our president Woodrow Wilson was born and raised and where Michael Jordan went to high school and was kicked off the sophmore basketball team because he wasn't any good? These and many other interesting facts were given to us by the driver who had his script downpat. The old homes were gorgeous and I loved seeing the moss hanging off the trees (very Southern). Jasmine got a bit bored but she behaved which we were happy about! After the trolley ride we went into a quaint little market, the oldest in Wilmington, where artisans display their wares and we bought a few fun things, mostly for Jasmine. We had lunch at a nice waterfront (the Cape Fear River) restaurant called Elijah's that had some great crab dip and Lorne experienced his first softshell crab sandwich (they deepfry the whole crab and lay it on the bun - very interesting when it gets to you). I played it safe and had flank steak. After lunch, we walked the boardwalk and I took some great pictures of Jasmine. We headed back to our car so we could go visit the USS North Carolina, a battleship that was in service during WWII. It was the BIG thing to do in Wilmington so we decided we had to go see it. Let me tell you, it was so interesting, I dind't think I would enjoy it but I must have forgotten that I like living history, history you can touch and explore. My imagination went crazy wrapping my mind around how it must have been to be on that ship with so many other people. It was a whole town on one ship. It was enormous and we were able to tour the entire belly of the ship, many levels and miles of walking. I couldn't believe they would give us so much access, and they had it set up beautifully, complete with cardboard cutouts of men working so you could imagine how many were squeezed into any given place at one time. I was impressed and awed and we spent about 3 hours there. Jasmine was a trooper, she walked up and down many ladders and walked and walked. She was exhausted by the time we finally left the ship (with some unexplored parts). We took her back to the hotel for a short late nap before heading off to dinner. Jasmine had fun in the gift shop where she donned a military helmet, grabbed a flag and sang God Bless America for the crowd. People clapped for her and we just couldn't believe how amazing she is to just love to perform for people wherever we are. Before dinner we hit the beach to fly a kite. We figured it would be nice and windy at the beach so it should not be a problem to fly it but we were wrong. There wasn't very much wind at all and we ended up working our tails off trying to keep the kite in the air. It was very fun but tiring and we ended up giving up after about 15 minutes. We took some great family pictures though. We found the cutest Italian restaurant for dinner called Osteria Cicchetti and the food was fabulous. We had meatballs as an appetizer and shared a yummy salad before I dove into my meal of spaghetti and meatballs and sausage (I know, I was just in the mood and it happened to be really good there!) and Lorne had a special linguini with sun dried tomatos, chicken and a lemon sauce.

By the time we got back to the hotel it was well after 10 PM and way past Jasmine's bedtime. We brought a little cot from home to see how she would respond to not being in a crib and she did great. She never got out of the bed and waited for us to come get her in the morning. What a darling!