July 3
We managed to get Gimli out of the trailer today (after dousing him with bug spray), and we all went down to the water at low tide. We stayed there for a while, but it was really not as fun as we had hoped. Three reasons for that:
#1: The mud at the seashore is thick and black and smells terrible and tries to "eat" your shoes at every opportunity!
#2: The grass there can be quite painful. I think it is called "saw grass" or "razor grass", or some such thing; and when it rubs against your legs, it can actually cut you! We were all wearing shorts, and our legs are so scratched up now! And poor Frodo cried so bad when I cleaned his cuts and scrapes when we got back to the trailer!
#3: There are thousands of tiny little crabs out there by the water, and they look like bugs. In fact, Gimli swore up and down that they were bugs; and so he tried to run back to the grass. But his shoes got stuck in the mud and came off, so then he froze because he was afraid he would step bare-footed on the crabs, and Thorin had to carry him to the trailer on his back (and Thorin already has back problems!).
So, I don't think we'll get Gimli near the ocean again for a while, and in fact I don't think he'll leave the trailer until we make him. And I can't see us actually doing that, really. At least, not for a while. But, well, he was at least thrilled to see real palm trees for the first time in his life!