It was the best of times, it was the worst of times

It has been starting to hit me. I don't know anybody. My kids don't have friends. I'm lonely! Why does everything have to break (dryer, air conditioner, Internet, door knob, windows, faucets- to just name a few of the issues we've been dealing with)? Steve says I'm experiencing a self-fulfilling prophecy, but when you can't even go grocery shopping without dropping huge cans of pineapple on your sandal clad feet, you start to wonder if someone is trying to tell you something.

I was determined this weekend to leave my concerns behind me and just have an enjoyable day with my family at the beach. We are blessed to live right by a beautiful lake and it was time to take advantage of the amazing natural resources around us. So I did a little research and came across a state park that you hike into to reach a peninsula with sandy beaches. It sounded perfect and my family agreed.

Saturday morning came and we packed up the car and headed out. We located the park with little trouble and got started on our little hike. Rowan was beside himself with excitement and kept saying "This is my favorite day in South Carolina!"



Aside from having slightly flat tires in the jogging stroller, everything went off without a hitch. We met up with someone who have camped in the park overnight and he directed us to the following site-



It was a little piece of paradise. Private, sunny with shade, pristine clear water at a perfect temperature, and really nice sand. We soaked it in.









We ate a picnic lunch and swam some more before we decided it was time to go back and face reality. There was a big to do list waiting for us at home and we wanted to tackle some projects before Sunday came. So, we hiked back to our parking spot and found this:


Tire tracks from where our car had apparently been towed. Now let me ask you, would you feel comfortable parking here?


To be fair if you look at the far right of this scene, you would see this:

A close up of the sign in front of the gate


But we weren't parked inside, beside, or beyond the gate. We were way outside of the gate in what looked to us to be a parking lot so people could go enjoy this state park. Apparently we were wrong. What I don't understand is why they didn't put a sign in front of the actual parking lot instead of to the side of it and in front of the gate. Or why they didn't just give us a ticket instead of leaving us stranded in the middle of nowhere with two kids and no indication of where we could find our car. They recently changed the laws so that this state park is only accessible by boat (a bit elitist, don't you think?). It took us 8 hours, one very long cab ride (which was really just another awful reminder that we don't know anyone in the area who we could call for help), a trip to the police station, several trips to the impound lot (impound owners are neither accessible nor punctual), many phone calls and a whole lot of cash to finally reclaim our vehicle. Perhaps one day I will laugh at this experience. Right now all I feel is sadness. Not over the money or the inconvenience, but the fact that the sole purpose of this trip was to find something good about living here. Needless to say, that didn't happen.