Chugga Chugga

There was quite possibly one thing that came close to topping the beach in little man's eyes while on our sunny getaway.

We had been told many times that the train museum in Naples was a great place to take little ones, especially little boys.

And our little boy loves trains.

So, one morning we headed out to the museum. We had been told it was only open certain days and had sporadic hours, so we crossed our fingers that today was one of those days.

As we rounded the corner, little man immediately zeroed in on the train sitting outside of said museum.

Fortunately for us, it was open.

There were few people there, so little man definitely had the run of the place. The inside of the museum was a large model train display. All types of model trains were running in and out, up mountains, through tunnels and stopping at miniature depots.

However, outside was the real treasure - at least in little man's eyes.

A real toy train.

A real toy train that you could ride on, that is.

As mentioned before, there were few people there when we first arrived, so little man took advantage of that (and the fact that the old man running the train was clearly a grandpa-type who loved little kids) by riding the train no less than four times in row.

And when that was over, little man had the opportunity to sit in the conductor's seat.

And honk the horn.

Little man was so excited he could barely stand it. With each honk, his big blue eyes would light up and he would laugh a big, happy 3-year-old belly laugh.

I thought we would be there all day.

And if little man had his way, we would have been.

However, Mama did hold the trump card.

"Don't you want to go to the beach?" I asked little man.

"Yeah! I wanna go to beach," he said.

"Well then we have to say bye-bye to the trains," I replied.

Little man paused. I could tell he was running the scenario through in his mind. Trains or beach?

"I go to BEACH!" He finally exclaimed.

And so we loaded up and bid farewell to the trains.

And chugga chuggaed all the way to the beach.