Before reading about part two of my dismaying Delaware trip, if you haven’t already, go check out part one! For those of you who read part one and wondered if a part two would be coming out–here it is!

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Another beautiful sunrise at Bethany Beach, Delaware arose as my family and I woke up to prepare for yet another adventurous day. The sky was a breathtaking array of yellows, oranges, pinks, and blues, all blended together to create a work of art. We all quickly ate a bowl of cereal and got ready to head to the beach. Once we were finally loaded into the car, we set out in search of a less populated beach. (Every beach we went to seemed to have hundreds of people all crowded together.) We eventually found a beach that was desolate of people, except for a few fishermen on the shore. We got out, and headed for the waves.

We walked up and down the beach, looking up at the sky and watched it go from pretty blue skies to clouded up grey skies. “Look’s like it’s gonna rain,” my dad commented. I nodded in agreement. Soon, the light breeze that rolled off the oceans in wisps turned to more violent gusts that batted our hair in many different directions.

Suddenly, to the right of where we were walking, the fishermen started hustling and bustling around with a fishing line pulled tight. “I wonder what they caught,” my little brother commented, speaking for what each of us thought. Out of the water came a three foot baby shark!

“Woah!” we all exclaimed.

The fishermen quickly waved us over, eager to show off their catch. We looked at our parents, hoping they’d let us run over and see the shark. “Go ahead,” my mom said with a laugh. We jogged over to look at the shark, and the fishermen then instructed us how to pet the shark. My sister eagerly pet it first, then my brothers, and lastly, I did. Its rough skin was foreign on my fingers, and I didn’t exactly enjoy the feeling. Nonetheless, it was still extremely cool. Sooner than we expected, the fishermen gently let the shark back into the ocean, where it hurriedly escaped into the deep. We waved goodbye to the fishermen and continued on our way.

We kept watching the sky, hoping the rain would hold off, and kept close to the truck just in case. To our dismay, the rain had other plans and quickly started to fall. We watched as the fishermen packed up their supplies in a flash and sprinted off the beach. We all looked at each other, and we too sprinted for the truck. As we ran, the wind started whipping, sending sand flying off of our faces. (It was not a pleasant feeling.) I felt almost like I was in a dream where my running was in slow motion. I stumbled over sand, twigs, and shells that had washed ashore.

As I ran, I looked ahead and could see a wall of rain racing towards us as we sprinted for the truck. It was like a head-on collision–at one point, we were running with the wind in our faces, and the next we were fighting against rain, wind, and sand. The rain fell harder and harder until it was just pouring down. When we finally reached the truck we all hopped inside, soaking wet, red faces from being pelted with sand, and ready to go back to the condo. We got on the highway and drove into town. However, as we drove closer and closer to town we saw that it looked like most of the population in the town was leaving. My dad quickly made a few jokes about a hurricane evacuation, in which my littlest brother did not appreciate. He instead replied with, “It’s not a hurricane, it’s a tornado. I’m telling you it is.” Thinking no further than it being a mere joke, we continued into town.

Once we got back, the rain had ebbed a bit and we decided it would be a good time to check out the little shops. We went through shop after shop, buying a few things, and smiling at the other customers who thought shopping on a dreary day would be a good idea as well. The designs of the different shops were entrancing– each had its own theme and personal touch to make it unique. Eventually we came across a sweatshirt store and we all got sweatshirts since our clothes were sopping wet from the rain. The last shop we went into was a candy shop where we all got some goodies because the ice cream shops had closed. We ran for the truck as the rain continued to fall and found ourselves running through knee-high water. All of the people who were driving cars were practically sitting in water. The whole town was flooded! We lost flip flops as we sloshed through the water, almost lost some bags, all the while continuing to get poured on. We got into the truck and decided we had had enough.

After a long and extremely emotionally-draining day, we made it back to the condo. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief as we got inside because we knew that the rain, sand, and flood couldn’t get to us. Changed into the warmest clothes we had brought, we all settled down onto couches in the living room and watched as my dad pulled out his phone. He saw that my grandma had called and quickly went to call her back. With the phone just loud enough so we could hear, we heard my grandma exclaim, “Are you guys okay?!”

My dad waited a second before responding, “Umm, yes. Why?”

“I just happened to be clicking through the news and I saw that there was a violent tornado in a Delaware town. So I looked at it, and it was just outside the town you’re staying at.” Us kids looked at each other, dumbfounded. (My grandma was also still in PA so it was really weird how she had known what was happening in Delaware.)

“I told you it was a tornado,” my six-year old brother said with an annoyed look.

After assuring my grandma twenty times that nothing had gone wrong, my dad hung up. He came back into the living room–we all sat in silence, absorbing what had just happened. Suddenly, we all started laughing, not believing the incredulous events that had just happened. Nothing like a good old tornado a few miles from the beach we were at to liven up a vacation.

The day ended  as quickly as it had started, and we all crawled into our beds, utterly exhausted from yet another day in Delaware.

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Again during that vacation I learned the importance of being able to enjoy rather unfortunate experiences. To this day, we bring up our vacation to Delaware and laugh about it. Although none of us had wanted our vacation to be full of random and uncalled for events, I think it helped to make the vacation all the more extraordinary.