Carolina Low Country, Day 1 ... Friday

Once again, my family traveled to the Carolina coast for vacation this year.

Because my grandfather was having a procedure done early in the day on Friday, we didn't leave for South Carolina until 7 last night. After a brief stop at Wendy's for a quick bite to eat (and for my nephew, Drew, to spill a slap-FULL tray of Biggie-sized drinks all over the floor), we took to the open road.

Rider breakdowns:

In the Truck

• Ryan (my bro)
  
• Hayley (my sis-in-law)
  
• Mom
  
• Lindsey (my niece)
  
• Me
• Lindsey's stuffed dog
• Lindsey's stuffed bear
• Lindsey's stuffed poodle

In the Car

• Dad
• Matt (my bro-in-law)
  
• Christi (my sis)
  
• Drew (my nephew)
  
• Tanner (my other nephew)

I must say traveling at night is always a solid choice. Kids sleep, fewer cars are on the road, less traffic. We did have to sit for a while on I-20 outside of Augusta, GA, for road construction ... but after about 30 minutes, it was a wide-open drive to Florence where we decided to spend the night.

Along with everyone else.

Who knew there was a business conference in town. One would not expect such a thing in rural South Carolina. I know I didn't. But alas, it took us 3 hotels before we finally found one with a vacancy. And for the record, let's just say it wasn't the best option available—by far. But we made do with what we had and were happy to have a place to lay our heads for a few hours.

Of course, my sister would have no "laying of the heads" on a bed until each room had been properly doused with Lysol^®—thanks to our unfortunate stomach virus epidemic on vacation just 2 years prior. That year, one of the tiny tots picked up the bug the 1st day we arrived at our condo, and it worked its way through each family member by the end of the week, dark-clouding our sunny trip to the shore.

So lesson learned. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of Pepto Bismol and Emetrol.

Off we went at 2:00 a.m. to find disinfectant. Lucky for us, a truck-stop gas station with bars on the window had a teeny-tiny can from before the dawn of man. They sold it to us for the low-low price of $6.

Obviously, it was not on rollback.

We fumigated 3 hotel rooms, 6 double beds, 3 rooms of carpet, 8 doors, and 3 kids before calling it a night.