Our Vacation
Mom and Dad had worked hard all year and the time had come for our annual vacation to the ocean. My sister Sue and I had looked forward to this all year long.
We were finally there. The sun was shining, not a cloud in the sky. The ocean was bluer than we had remembered. Everything was perfect.
The first day we walked up and down the beachfront taking in everything and oh! the smell of that ocean air!
In the afternoons, my sister and I would spend our time lying on our backs. We would watch the seagulls gliding so gracefully on the ocean breezes to and from the cliffs. Sister Sue and I knew that the gulls had their nests on those cliffs.
I said how neat it would be if we could be up there with the gulls and see their nests, gently touch their speckled eggs and maybe even pet a chick that was nestled on its cliff home.
The more I looked at the cliffs, the more accessible they seemed. To start with, at the bottom there was a green bushed area - not too steep and easy to climb. You could see the tracks left by other people who had adventured in that direction.
Mom and Dad had told us that we were free to wander the beach and footpath at the back - that was all. I said to my sister Sue that maybe we could head a little way up toward the cliffs so as to get a better look but she said a big no! My sister was the oldest and I knew I would need her cooperation if we were to get closer to those nests.
As the afternoon went on, I kept on and on at my sister until eventually she cracked! She agreed to go up the grassy area which appeared not too steep; after all, I explained what harm could it do since Mom and Dad would never find out?
It did not take long to scrabble up the grassy area. There were a few rocky areas that we managed to get over by getting on our hands and knees. Before we knew it, we were at the base of the cliffs.
We stood there for some while and just gazed up to the sky. The sea gulls seemed even closer and so did their nests. Being at the base of the cliffs made them seem not as steep or as high as they did from the beach, and those nests seemed so close, oh so close.
My sister took a little persuasion and against her better judgment, we began our climb of the cliffs - our eyes affixed to those graceful birds gliding in the sky and the nests which now seemed so close.
It was quite easy going. We did not once stop to look back. There were plenty of places to hold on to and put our feet. We would be up and back before Mom and Dad knew we were gone.
It seemed like only minutes had passed and we were finally just a body length short of those nests. We looked down then - had these cliffs grown while we had been climbing? The sand of the beach and the rolling blue sea all seemed so far away.
As I looked back up to the nests and back down to the ocean, the cliff seemed to be vertical not just steep as it had seemed before. I broke out into a sweat. We were stuck - neither could we move up or down. My sister Sue began to sob. I was so scared - tears ran down my face and I tightened my grip. The nests seemed of little importance now.
It seemed like hours had passed with us hanging onto that cliff and crying when suddenly we heard a strange noise," baaaa, baaaa, baaaa" - sheep.
Hearing the commotion on the cliff face, the sheep had gathered at the top of the cliff and gazed down at us - they seemed to be saying, "Look at those two idiots."
Slowly more and more sheep gathered at the top to enjoy the spectacle. But then appeared the farmer's head! He had come down the pasture to see what his sheep found so interesting.
The farmer said harsh words over the cliff at us but I was so glad to see him, I didn't care. We were going to be saved!
Moments later the farmer was wielding a long stick over the cliff edge, first to sister Sue. She grabbed hold, the farmer pulled and soon she was on solid ground. My turn was next - I was never so happy to be upright on my feet! Our bodies ached so bad, we both shook. Our fingers were sore from hanging on for dear life.
The farmer called us names and rightly so. It soon became apparent that we were not the first to think we could climb to visit the gulls.
The farmer piled us into his truck and drove us to the beach where we soon found Mom and Dad pacing the beach and thinking we had drowned.
Once we were reunited and thoroughly grounded, we decided that from then on we should always do exactly as we were told.
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