The Ultimate Beach Life Kit!

There really is a fine art to creating the perfect beach kit for your next beach day or week. My husband is from the south of Spain and spent his summers in a beachside town on the Atlantic Ocean, so I felt he was more than qualified to curate this post.

After visiting a few stores and browsing a few sites online, my husband decided just to buy everything from Amazon. We were a little worried about the quality and durability of the Beach umbrella as it was less than 30 euros, but it’s fantastic!

Proving that there are some excellent deals out there and to believe the reviews, not the price, when worried about a product’s quality.

We went to the beach last weekend and tried our new gear – fabulous! We were delighted with our kit and are confident our upcoming beach holiday will be a blast – we just need to remember more sunscreen!

Things you will need:

Beach Umbrella – some have a pivotal bottom piece to put the umbrella at an angle, and some pieces must be purchased separately. However, we forgot the piece at home, and the umbrella was still great – we’ll remember it for our beach holiday.

Beach bag – I found this at a market stall outside El Cortes Ingles in Seville, but you get the idea—just a nice big bag to carry towels, water bottles, books, sunscreen, etc. We also added one ice pack to keep our bottles of water cold.

Sunscreen and bug spray – the sunscreen is a must; even on a hazy, cloudy day, the sun is still hot. We also wear rashguards, but our legs and feet got slightly burned on our last outing.

Cooler, and don’t forget the ice packs! I have so many childhood memories of massive coolers being lugged to and from the city to the cottage, but for daily beach outings, a small 16L cooler is perfect.

We fit an ice pack, three non-alcoholic beers, a container of 6 vegan empanadas, a small bag of mixed nuts, two corn cakes, peanut butter, and raisin sandwiches, and a container of grapes. A cooler this size also makes an excellent footrest – just saying.

Beach mats – perfect for underneath towels to create a flatter, more comfortable place to sit.

Beach chairs and towels. We could add one more chair for our son, but our car trunk is getting pretty full! If we find a really great kid’s beach chair, we’ll add it; otherwise, we share the chairs and the towel on the beach mat.

And, of course, beach towels. I love buying beach towels when we’re on vacation. We have some from Lanzarote and Fuerteventura. I can’t wait to get one from Empuriabrava.

Finally, if you’re like me, you need a Ukulele! I brought a soprano as I expected the beach to be crowded and wanted to practice my strumming and chord transitions without bothering anyone. 

However, I will bring one of my tenor ukuleles when we go for a week. There will be plenty of times to play on the beach in the evening or at the Airbnb.

It’s just important to be mindful of others – Shockingly, not everyone loves the ukulele! 

All photos by Author or Author’s husband.