Thou Shalt Take the Kids Trick or Treating - Or Not?

Today we were faced with a Big Parental Dilemma.

Two scenarios:

1. Perform expected parental duty of taking the kids trick or treating.  Doing this would require going to a town and either docking at a marina (with minimum cost probably around $50) or anchoring close enough to dinghy into shore.  As trick or treating would likely stretch past sunset, we would probably choose the marina due to forecasts of high SW winds causing tricky conditions for using the dinghy.  

2. Do not perform expected parental duty of taking the kids trick or treating. Save $50. Anchor in a safe place protected from the forecasted high winds.  Be wrought by high levels of guilt for not taking the kids trick or treating.

The only town we could go to today was Belhaven, NC.  Earlier in the week we had thought about staying in Elizabeth City a few extra nights as trick or treating prospects seemed more favorable there (population of 18,000 vs Belhaven's population of 1,700).  Fellow cruisers that had visited Belhaven several times before had also warned us we might not find good trick or treating close to the marinas there.  The decision to leave Elizabeth City was made not without some angst.

We love holidays.  At home, I would probable have already attended two or three classroom Halloween parties, baked and decorated several dozen Halloween cookies, spent the past month making or finding Halloween costumes, etc.   Who does not remember the excitement one feels as a child looking forward to trick or treating?  How could we take that away from the kids?!!

For other holidays, there are alternatives.  In the past when the kids were younger, Jamey and I have changed the date of Christmas when I've had to work Christmas morning.  We've been flexible with our celebration of Valentine's Day, Easter, and even Thanksgiving.  But true house-to-house trick or treating really is an October 31 thing.

Well, after much discussion and with consideration of weather, cost, and parental obligation, we chose #2 and anchored in the middle of nowhere.  We involved the kids in the decision making, and surprisingly they were excited and happy about our alternative Halloween.  We decorated the boat with fake spider webs (which make very good tell-tales hung from a shroud to help with reading the wind), had a candy hunt, created a haunted house, used the letters of Halloween to make smaller words (52), played with face paint, and went trick or treating in the boat (V-berth, back berth, under-the-table fort).

It was our best Halloween ever.  I like to think it's our great parental ingenuity that made the kids only minimally wistful for the trick or treating that could have been.  In the end, though, I think it was just that they still got lots of candy.  Happy Halloween!

A beautiful day and a lollipop -- this is the life!

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WHERE WE STARTED:  Anchored in the south end of the Alligator River around one mile east of the canal heading south.  The Alligator River is part of the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge which protects the pocosin ("swamp on a hill"), a unique wetland habitat type.

WHERE WE ARE:  Anchored in Crabtree Bay, the headwaters of the Pungo River.  Good hold, protected in all directions.  Ample room, and there were five sailboats anchored in the area by the end of the day, all seeking shelter from the big gusts expected tonight and tomorrow.

THERE TO HERE: 27 miles, motoring down the Alligator River Pungo River Canal.  Peaceful and beautiful like the Dismal Swamp Canal but wider and with more traffic.  Important to stay in the center of the canal.  Nancy at the helm.

Feeling fancy and "boo"tiful!