At the Beach

A week at the Jersey Shore. Wildwood Crest, to be precise. The southernmost end of the Wildwoods. All that's left after the Crest is Cape May and the Atlantic. Ocean, that is. This was my third year of vaca with my youngest son and his family. DIL rents a condo and we do spend the week in comfort. This year's was beach-block. In the Crest, that's very desirable, because crossing the sand to get to the edge of the ocean is quite a walk in itself. In North Wildwood and Wildwood it's an even longer walk. The Wildwoods do have a lot of beach. If you are a beach devotee, you probably have heard that Wildwood is a loud, rowdy,raucous, drunken-party kind of town. You must come to the Crest. It's not at all like you've heard.

So we had a three BR, two bath first floor condo. Nicely furnished and clean as a whistle. Balcony overlooking the well-maintained pool and grill area.

Breakfast in the condo, sandwiches and snacks on the beach, dinner at one or the other of the hundreds of restaurants in the area. Some are good, some are very good and some are just revolting. One night of a seafood feast but we bypass the over-priced all you can eat seafood buffets and opt to cook our own feast in our condo. Shop-Rite has some excellent deals on crab, shrimp, scallops, etc. Our feast, with left-overs, cost about a fourth of what we would have spent at Urie's.

The boardwalk is as gaudy, glitzy, crowded as I remembered from my childhood vacations. The only difference - it was fun then. And it's still fun for the kids. At one spot on the BW, at one of the numerous pizza joints, there was a man tossing pizza dough in a showy manner. He delights in selecting someone, usually a child, from the onlookers and making the dough into a t-shirt. It is kinda cute and they take a photo which can be seen on Facebook. My eight-year-old Granddaughter, who is a ham anyway, was one of the lucky girls who wore this silly garment and had fun doing it.

Lazy days building sand castles and hauling buckets of sea water up the beach to moisten the quick-drying towers seems to be a lot of fun. For the kids. As for me, sitting quietly and reading my Kindle is fun enough for me.

A day in Cape May to wander the shopping district (high-priced clothing, for the most part), and roam the book store. Enjoyed watching the people climb into the horse-drawn open carriages for a half-hour tour of the residential streets with the charming Victorian homes. Forty-five dollars for one person, $60. for two and increments for each add'l passenger. We passed on the trip. Cape May does have a wonderful Zoo/Park and is run by volunteers. Wholly operates on donations and endowments. The animals are scattered about in native habitats, for the most part, and the fences that surround them are mostly disguised. We didn't go this year, but it is a nice way to spend a few hours.

The consensus? A week is too short.