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SUN-AND-A-BEACH

  • 9-1-2011
  • Categorized in: Family

seashells.jpg

It’s day 6 of our family vacation. Standing about fifteen feet offshore, neck-deep in seawater, I was surrounded by happy families, including my own. We were all wave jumping and bobbing to the rollers as they crashed on shore. While fun, the one issue is that if you don’t time your jump just right, the wave will knock you over, dragging you through the sand, embedding it everywhere. When this happens, every movement comes irritating pains. After getting slammed into the rash inducing sand, I found myself wondering if it would even be possible to rid myself of the very jagged bits of shell and sand that was wrecking havoc on my body or would I have to wait until we got back to the beach-house to shower off? Would I even make it? 

The sun was crazy-hot that day, with most of North America baking to a crisp in the heat wave that saw record temperatures in late July. But we were in Long Beach Island, New Jersey (or LBI to the locals), and the breeze was cool and the ocean temporizing – perhaps the only comfortable place on the Eastern Seaboard, allowing us to enjoy the great outdoors during our entire trip.

LBI is a 30 km-long barrier island (located about 90 km east of Philadelphia and 120 km south of New York City) in an area commonly known as the Jersey Shores. The area is made up of six small communities with a total population of less than 9,000, but during the summer holiday season LBI swells to approximately 100,000 inhabitants, made up mostly of part-time residents and tourists. The island is the playground for many wealthy families in the Tri-State Area, who access their multi-million dollar beach homes via one bridge from the mainland. That bridge, which funnels everyone on and off LBI, leads to one main artery that runs the length of the entire island.

This was our second trip to LBI. Despite the ten-hour drive from Toronto, our kids had unanimously voted to come back (albeit with the promise of spending a few days in nearby Manhattan before coming home). This is somewhat amazing when you consider that there are no fast-food chain restaurants or movie theatres on the entire island. We rented a beach house for a week in Harvey Cedars, a quieter, family-oriented community on the north side of the island (if you’re looking for the chaos of boardwalks, surfers and shirtless drunken teens, then I recommend the south side of the island). The rental property abutted a small lagoon on the bay side of the island. It was less than a five minute walk to beautifully maintained, clean, white-sand beaches and although the island is pretty urbanized, wild animals were everywhere, from the fish that swim right up to the pier to the sea birds that fed on them.

LBI is decidedly laid-back, but we were consistently busy with numerous outdoor activities. Like many visitors, I did a lot of running during our stay, as LBI is great for running. The main road - though extremely busy - is flat with wide shoulders made for pedestrians. An unusual unwritten traffic rule of the island is that cars stop for any pedestrian at any place – the whole island is like one big perpetual cross-walk. The road shielded by the cooling onshore breezes had no real shade and was extremely hot, so I waited until late in the afternoon for my workouts (I did manage to get three 10 km runs in during our stay).

My wife and kids rented bikes for the week and went on daily rides for fun (and to pick up extra food for meals - www.surfbuggylbi.com). As LBI veterans we knew to bring groceries from home, but there are many little markets that dot the island. Near the northern end of the island there is Viking Village where the daily catch of fresh fish and seafood is cleaned and processed for sale to top-end restaurants across the United States and is also available for purchase by the locals (www.vikingvillage.net). Towards the south are the restaurants, mini-golf courses, and ice cream parlors. Our favourite ice cream spot is the The Big Dipper in Surf City, where you can get a single scoop for $3.50 (which doesn’t sound that impressive until you learn that each scoop is about a half-liter in size).

When we weren’t running or cycling, we spent our time frolicking in the ocean. LBI boasts almost 30 km of uninterrupted beach, with each community ensuring safety with a network of well-trained lifeguards. Each day my wife and I went for hour-long beach walks while my boys and I had fun collecting shells and seeing what washed up on the shore. Some of the bounty and oddities included the full carcass of a pre-historic looking oyster cracker fish and a beautiful blue crab arm, complete with claw (note: crab claws should not be kept un-refrigerated, wrapped in tissue beside ones’ bed, a lesson we learned the hard way). We brought a Beam-O kite (which looks like a Frisbee as big as a hula-hoop), a bocce set to play on the beach, and rented a Hobie Wave to go sailing in (www.harveycedarsmarina.com). I come from a family of recreational and amateur racing sailors and my teen years were spent learning to sail on Lake Ontario and then teaching kids how to sail at overnight summer camps. While you never really forget how to sail, it was a bit of a challenge to do so on the ocean in 50 km winds, with five people on a boat meant for three. We didn’t tip over (virtually impossible on a catamaran) but we were nice and wet from the waves and sped through the Atlantic – a highlight of the trip.

The only lowlight of the trip? The aforementioned sand-in-everything. But we persevere, and I was able to clean off, recover, and continue my vacation without excessive discomfort (well, until it was time to drive back).

 

Jamie Bussin is the Publisher of Tonic Magazine and the Recreational Director of the Annual Bussin Family Road Trip


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