Their slogan claims "more than a vacation, it's tradition," and that it was for my sister, Barb Wolfe and me. Going "down the Shore" to Ocean City, New Jersey defined our summers until we were young adults. When we took our husbands on a post-Labor Day trip recently, it marked my first return in more than 20 years.
Our friends here in the Eastern Panhandle were somewhat mystified. They know about Ocean City, Maryland but scarcely anyone believed there was ANOTHER and quite different Ocean City in New Jersey.
In spite of the destruction caused by Hurricane Sandy in 2012, much remains unchanged, especially one major distinction. Ocean City is a dry town - no bars, no wine in restaurants, no liquor stores. This remnant of Ocean City's founding as a healthy family resort by a quartet of Methodist ministers in the late 19th century, continues to be supported in votes by the city's 7,000 or so full-time residents. Ocean City proudly boasts of its Travel Channel rating as the No. 1 family beach resort in America - and no booze is one major reason for the title.
Many long time visitors blame the liquor ban for the lack of fine dining and emphasis on pizza and ice cream. Fortunately, the situation changes by crossing bridges to Sea Isle City at one end of the island and Atlantic City, a little further up the coast to the north.
Even staying within "dry" Ocean City, we found something more than pizza. Vittorio's is a year-old Italian restaurant owned by a pair of brothers and their assorted family members with a similar place in Pottstown, Penn. The affable Vittorio was part of the charm. After some cajoling, he even shared the secret orange sauce drizzled on the tender calamari appetizer which also came with standard marinara.
"It's lobster," he whispered in my ear. I was almost too busy keeping my husband from licking the bowl of crab and shrimp bisque we were sharing to respond to Vittorio's revelation. There were meatballs as big as softballs, authentic red sauce and juicy scallops coated with a creamy pesto sauce. The antipasta was a work of art as well as a taste treat.
My other food desire at the beach besides Italian was lobster, and for that we crossed the bridge to Fish Alley in Sea Isle City. We chose dockside dining at Carmen's from the cluster of seafood places. The busy casual restaurant was coping admirable with a sudden end-of-season disappearance of many staff. Service was excellent as was the food. We piled the table high with the remnants of broiled lobster tails, scallops, shrimp and flounder.
Those were our dinner choices. This was a beach getaway and we were basically committed to eating continually. Our light-eating tastes were more than satisfied by the excellent stuffed breads at Bennie's Bread. We learned the hard way on our first day that the pepperoni stuffed bread was mostly gone by 10 a.m. We could get sweet sausage or spinach or meatballs - but the pepperoni went first. Fortunately, the tasty fried mac and cheese was available all day. Sack of Subs was another carry out favorite. SoS offers nine different egg subs alone.
Intense in-house food competitions would have developed had we stayed longer. Instead, we limited ourselves to best sticky buns. Venerable Wards found it hard to compete with upstart Mallon's 14 varieties of sticky buns.
Candy is another major food group in Ocean City. Both Shrivers and Fralingers are longtime Boardwalk makers of the salt water taffy that is a must-take-home for most visitors. Rauhauser's is a chocolate producing candy store downtown. We were disappointed to discover we were too late in the season for their unforgettable chocolate covered fresh blueberry clusters.
This was the beach, our house was barely a block away and we indulged in dawn and dusk walks along the ocean. The beaches of the Jersey Shore are legendary and extend seemingly without break from Cape May to Sandy Hook - 130 miles in all.
On the eight-mile barrier island that is Ocean City, there are surfing beaches and sailing beaches and fishing areas. Boating adventures include sunset cruises, pirate voyages, fishing trips and whale watching excursions. Corson Inlet State Park at the wild south end was hyped as the prime place for sunrise watching.
In spite of that, we found that our 41st Street location was perfectly aligned to see the sun pop from the ocean horizon. One unchangeable fact about east coast beaches is that sunrise is ideal photo op time with sunsets happening "on the other side."
The Ocean City shoreline took a beating from Hurricane Sandy. In the three years since the disaster, dunes have been rebuilt and strengthened, making the beach less open but more natural. Ocean-front housing looks virtually unchanged except that a few more have been crammed onto streets one or two blocks from the beach. There are a few hotels: notably the amenity-rich Port-O-Call and the all-suites Flanders, but most of the island is covered in houses, blocks and blocks of duplexes rented by the week.
We used Berger Realty which had plenty of options online. We were comfortable with two bedrooms, two baths and an open space living/dining and kitchen. Our only complaint was the impossibly slow wireless in the house. Ocean City could benefit greatly by investing in providing the whole island fast and free wireless service.
Shopping is trinket oriented on the 2.5 mile boardwalk with "real" shopping on Asbury Ave. downtown - more than 250 enterprises in all. My grandmother would talk about "walking the boards." Sometimes it seemed like the point now is to eat the boardwalk end to end, indulging in pizza, French fries, ice cream, popcorn, smoothies and more.
One day we sampled the Historic Museum and learned fascinating stories. Along with the memory of Grace Kelly and her family's summer home, there is the century-old wreck of the huge four-masted Sindia carrying ceramics, screens and artifacts from Japan. Unrescued treasure is still buried under sand about 300 yards off the beach between 16th and 17th streets should you want to engage in treasure hunting - but not for gold.
This was a family vacation and my sister kept talking about Lucy, and having our picture taken with Lucy. I had an image of a statue of "I Love Lucy," but in fact, it was Lucy the giant elephant which she claimed we visited often as kids.
I suppose I could pretend that visits to Lucy inspired my later efforts as chronicler of West Virginia's oddities - if I remembered ever seeing the 65-foot wooden elephant. Built in 1881, Lucy is identified as America's oldest roadside attraction. She is also patented. Lucy is located in Margate, a sign-change in the road from Ocean City to Atlantic City. Her gift shop boasts an extensive collection of trinkets branded Lucy.
Coming on the edge of Labor Day, we found the best of all worlds. Weather was perfect, shops and eateries were all still open but the crowds and lines were gone. There was open space on the beach and no beach tags were required. You could even slip a little white dog onto the beach at sunrise in spite of signs that said no dogs until October. We looked at calendars for the just-passed summer season filled with sidewalk sales and market days, concerts, theater and plenty of entertainment. We were pleased with the peace and quiet.
For more information check oceancityvacation.com.
Jeanne Mozier, of Berkeley Springs, is the author of "Way Out in West Virginia," a must-have guide to the wonders and oddities of the Mountain State. She and noted photographer Steve Shaluta have released the second printing of the coffee-table photo book "West Virginia Beauty, Familiar and Rare." Both books are available around West Virginia and from WVBookCo.com.