Huntington Beach, CA

I have returned safely from my vacation to California. I had a great time at Huntington Beach. The hotel was called the Hyatt Regency and it was basically a castle/resort. It was so cool. I had never been to a place that nice before. Our room seemed like a house and there was pools and hot tubs everywhere. The hotel had restaurants, gift shops, bike rentals and of course the best thing: the Spa. We could look out the window of our room and see the Pacific Ocean. It was quite the place. Thursday when we landed in Los Angeles airport, called LAX, we rode the super shuttle to In-and-Out burger and had some delicious hamburgers at about midnight. We then arrived at our hotel at about 2 a.m. Sioux Falls time, but we were too excited to sleep, so we stayed up even longer. Friday we all walked downtown and ate some breakfast at a place called Killarney's. I had a shrimp omlette. After some souvenir shopping, in which I bought Isabel a sea turtle necklace, my wife a sweet bracelet, and Olivia a bracelet that said "Olivia Katniss", we headed for the beach. From 10 a.m. to about 5:00 p.m., my buddies and I played sand volleyball, sand football, swam in the ocean, body surfed, boogie boarded and chilled on the beach. There were many people on the beach, but the beach itself is so massive that it didn't feel crowded. The water was very cold at first, but once you got used to it, it felt great. It was also very salty. The waves were huge, probably about 6-7 feet high and constantly crashing us. After all day at the beach, we were all pretty tired so we relaxed in the Spa for about an hour, then ate supper. Saturday started off with a great workout at the fitness center with my buddies, then we again hit the beach for more football, waves, and swimming. Saturday night was a big highlight. We all rented bikes from the hotel and rode about 5 miles to Newport beach to eat at this awesome seafood place. It was so fun riding bikes together because we had a group of 22 people, which makes for a big bike gang. We were definitely stared at a lot as we rode down the boardwalk. After we ate, we rode back to our hotel in the dark, which was also quite the experience. Sunday, we just hung out around our hotel, went to the Spa and packed for our flight home. A very nice guy from Egypt drove us in the Super Shuttle from our hotel to LAX, where we boarded our plane and flew home. It was a great time and everybody had a lot of fun. I was happy to be home though, for I missed my family immensely. It was definitely an experience I will not soon forget. California and LA is quite the place. So much different than South Dakota you have to see it to understand. Now, we are all back to shingling in the heat. -Mr. Klumper