A MEMORABLE PLACE
By Leslie Ebert
Special to the Sun
Since I was a child, I've always looked forward to August, when the family would pack up for our annual trip to Delaware's Rehoboth Beach. My parents packed us five kids up and headed for "the Jersey Street" beach house that smelled of pine cones and a woodsy, salty smell embedded in the big, screened-in porch out front. We would smell the salty sea air miles away and already taste the corn on the cob and bluefish dinners in our mouths.
As my mother grabbed the baby, the rest of us little kids would jump frantically out of the car to check whether the house was as we'd left it the year before. Away from his work routine, my father was a different person. He spent time with us and even gave us frozen Milky Way candy bars, a real treat.
Later in the week the extended family would arrive -- the grandparents, an aunt and uncle and cousins. We couldn't wait to show them "our beach" and our world. This world included sunburns, jumping waves, sleepy, peaceful days, reading books and, of course, the amusement park and evening treats on the boardwalk.
Later in our teen years, we traveled to more distant and exotic locales, including a cross-country trip, but those memories are more fleeting.
As adults, we have once again returned to our beloved beach for Year 2 of a family reunion. My siblings come from California, bringing their children. We adult children have careers and full lives, and like the beach, we have survived our personal storms.
Here we remember what matters. We are personally very changed, yet at the beach we remain the same, as though briefly locked together again in the timeless bliss of our youth.
Leslie Ebert lives in Jessup.
MY BEST SHOT
Weird and wild Lake Powell
By Gail Parker, Timonium
In the summer of 1997, our family spent several days houseboating on Lake Powell, a flooded canyon that stretches nearly 200 miles from northern Arizona into Utah. The scenery is weird and wild by East Coast standards, with enormous red rocks shooting skyward, dotted with scrubby vegetation. This photo is from our stop at Rainbow Bridge. Sacred to Native Americans, this huge natural arch was formed over time by stream erosion.
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Peru
Ann and Trev Warfield, Baltimore
"We have just returned from a trip to South America -- the highlight of which was a three-night stay in a camp deep in the Peruvian jungle. Walking a quarter mile on a rope bridge 150 feet through the trees and vines above the rain forest was an incredible experience."
LET US HEAR FROM YOU
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* Give us your recommendations of places to visit. Where are you just back from? Tell us where you've recently visited and what tips you can pass along about your trip to other readers. Or tell us about your favorite destinations. Our current question: Where is your favorite Civil War site? Please answer in 50 words or less.
* In 500 words or less, tell us about a travel experience that changed you, about the nostalgia a certain place evokes, about the power of a favorite beach, the mountains, a city cafe. (Cash value: $150)
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Pub Date: 03/14/99