Headed to the Beach!

Yesterday we walked Griffin over to the beach for his first real taste of Thailand paradise. Bang Tao beach is a beautiful beach that has some tourists, but is a bit more off the regular tourist route so it tends to be very calm and not very crowded. There are still stretches of the beach that are completely empty. It's also very calm in terms of the waves, and has a long, shallow beach that goes into the ocean, so you have to go very far out if you want to be deep. Which makes it great for families. And incidentally, for dogs- this was Portia and Bentley's absolute favorite place. I was a little sad being there with Griffin for the first time- our little family- without the dogs. Portia would just swim and swim forever, though honestly, she always preferred it later in the year when the seas get rough and the surf is higher and she can wave crash. Bentley was always pretty young when we came, so he would wade in the water up to his knees or so but preferred to hang close to us on the beach, or to play with the other beach dogs. Which is ironic, since he's the one who's now having issues socializing with other dogs at home!

Griffin had actually been to the beach once before, when he was about 3 months old, when we went to Ocean City for a few days with friends. But this time he could sit in the sand (which went right in his mouth!) and sit in the water and play around with us. The water was SO warm, like bathwater- it was gorgeous. He was a bit apprehensive when even the tiniest of waves came in, but as long as he was gripping on to either Steve or I, he was ok with it. So we'll head back again and keep spending little bits of time there. Luckily we also have the swimming pool at our complex, which he loves!