church beach day

During the summer Faith Bible Church has a couple "Beach Days".  Families pack a picnic lunch and after church drive down to Oceanside Beach - a 45 minute drive.  A few guys had arrived earlier in the day to "reserve" a large spot for us all.  The Manten family were still with us and they enjoyed the time at the beach.  Living now in Switzerland, there are no beaches, just lakes.  It's kind of hard to imagine, especially coming from NZ, when you're never too far from a beach anywhere you go in the country!

Nige and I had actually gone down to San Diego earlier that morning, as Nige had been invited to preach at Lighthouse Bible Church, and so we were able to just meet everyone at the beach, which was on the way home anyways.  This was the first new church we have visited since being here and it was lovely to meet the people there.  A number of the songs that were sung during the service were ones we knew from back home, and it was nice to sing songs we were familiar with, again.

Our group.

Later in the afternoon, the guys got to BBQ'ing hotdogs for everyone.

Behind where we were sitting on the beach was this row of 1920's cottages.  I went over and talked with one of the couples who were sitting on their front porch, and found out they were California's first 'condos'.  They're called Roberts Cottages, and were once a motel, but then they sold each unit off individually.  Nowadays, some of the owners rent them out a week at time.  They are very cute, and it would be lovely waking up each morning SO close to the ocean.