Last week’s newsletter highlighting the band Three and One getting the hook midway through their outdoor 6 to 10 p.m. set at Gully’s in Avalon prompted a lot of soul-searching.
Even though Avalon liquor licenses have limited outdoor music past 8 p.m. for years (not far behind is Sea Isle, where outdoor bars end music at 9 p.m.), many people felt that it illustrated something essential, and frustrating, about Avalon and the Shore’s changing identity.
Meanwhile, in Strathmere this week, the Deauville Inn said it was canceling its annual luau because a neighbor had complained before the event.
“Apparently tropical vibes are louder than we thought,” the historic inn wrote on Facebook, citing a “premature noise complaint” from a neighbor who is “not a fan of live music, fun or people enjoying themselves.”
The luau, sponsored by Kona Big Wave, was due to begin at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday; tickets for dinner and the show were listed as $117.23 plus tax. A Kona Big Wave Luau at Congress Hall on Aug. 20 in Cape May (no tickets required) looks like a go. (Deauville events director Judy Brenna Felicetta declined further comment).
What is the future of the freewheeling bar and music scene that has defined summers down the Shore, in Asbury Park legendarily, of course, but also in Avalon and elsewhere? Have things become too tightly controlled by the demands of wealthy homeowners who have scooped up real estate and turned the islands into noise-canceled enclaves?
Marc Ziss runs the Facebook page Bands in Avalon (and beyond). Last summer, he took me on a tour of the old Avalon, lamenting the fading of the live music scene.
He wrote:
Saw your piece on Gully’s and was reminded of our walk a while back where we saw the changes in Avalon. This year, like a breath of fresh air, a new venue tries to rekindle the soul of old Avalon, but new Avalon slaps it down and says that’s enough out of you!
Mike Hudome wrote:
What’s really going on here is people are searching for the Avalon of the ’70’s and ’80’s that no longer exists. They’ll never find it, and it is impossible to replicate.
Ira Dosovitz wrote:
I’ve been coming to Avalon for 40 years, and have seen the place transition from a somewhat casual, family-oriented beach town to a more corporate vibe destination. Having said that, I still feel that Avalon is right to place strictures on the music at Gully’s. Avalon is still a family town, and that should be respected.
📮 What is the future of music down the Shore? Has there been a culture shift? Where do you go to hear music? (I’m a fan of the free music series on the A.C. Boardwalk at Kennedy Plaza, where jazz returns this week.) Related, is $117.23 per person too much for a dinner and luau performance? Let me know what you think by replying to this email and I’ll include your most interesting responses.
Have ideas or news tips about the Shore or this newsletter? Pet peeves for us to opine on? Send them to me here.
🌞 Forecasters said it would rain all week but except for Monday, it’s been lovely. So just come down already.
— Amy S. Rosenberg (Find me at @amysrosenberg, or on Instagram at @amysrosenberg. 📧 Email me here.)
Shore talk
🎳 Avalon’s biggest home has been greenlit by borough and state officials: a whopping 17,694-square-foot house and carriage house to be built on Avalon’s high dunes at 5475 Dune Drive. In an intra-island twist, the builder is Eustace Mita, the developer who has proposed a luxury hotel on the site of Ocean City’s old Wonderland Pier.
Mita says the house is not for his personal use. He’s looking for a buyer who will appreciate amenities like a bowling alley, recording studio, golf simulator, and cold plunge. LeBron? Taylor? More on that house here.
☀️ The Soleil, a six-story hotel-condominium project at 11th and the boardwalk in Ocean City could break ground this fall, Bill Barlow reports.
🚀 Corson’s Inlet State Park was closed for about four hours this week after a rocket-assisted supply line launcher was found on the beach, state officials said.
🦀 Animal rights activists want Ocean City to use robot crabs instead of hermit crabs for its iconic Miss Crustacian Beauty Pageant and hermit crab races.
🎠 Relics from Wonderland Pier are still available for purchase at Obnoxious Antiques.
What to eat/What to do
🎶 Atlantic City’s beloved summer Chicken Bone Beach free jazz on the Boardwalk series returns to Kennedy Plaza this week with Warren Wolf and Wolfpack and local artist Keith Hollis beginning at 7 p.m. Thursday. Full schedule here.
🍸 Consider ordering a $1.1 million cocktail. It comes with a speedboat.
🍅 Check out Hira Qureshi’s guide and map of the Jersey Shore’s best farmers markets.
🍧 Here’s Hira’s report from Atlantic City’s water ice festival.
😋 In other water ice news, Ventnor’s North Beach Creamery is now offering a chocolate black cherry flavor. That’s chocolate with black cherries in one flavor.
😭 Visit the Wonderland Pier museum in the Promenade food court on the Ocean City Boardwalk through Aug. 9.
Shore snapshot
Vocab lesson: sea gorse
Not to be confused with seahorse, gorse (n) is a perennial, spiny shrub with green branches and shiny yellow flowers known to grow along coastlines, sometimes in an invasive fashion.
See the Shore memory below for its use in an ode to Avalon.
Ask Down the Shore: Ball playing
We asked our text group, The Shore Line, about etiquette around playing ball on the beach. Two texters said they’d been hit in the face with Frisbees, and one lost a tooth! My personal pet peeve is those who throw a football in the ocean over the heads of bathers, but I’m sure it’s fun.
Here’s a sample, lightly edited for clarity: Send your thoughts to us here.
Hello from Wildwood Crest! Our borough lifeguards maintain a very publicized posted rule about playing ball at the beach: only on the “Back Beach.”
I recently was sitting in a chair near the water’s edge and I got hit several times with either soccer balls or other throwable items. Most times the player apologized. It’s the beach, so you have to keep your head up and be on the defense at all times!
Many years ago a bunch of guys were playing Frisbee. The Frisbee hit me in the face along with the guy diving for it. I lost a tooth from the force of the hit and also needed root canal. They should be far from the crowds.
The beachgoer needs to relax. They are kids and we all did it as kids. It’s a public place and to expect kids not to be playing is ridiculous.
🧠 Trivia time
Reader Jacqui was first with the correct answer to last week’s water ice trivia question (Mento’s of course, which famously ended the free taste era with a sign: “Chocolate tastes like chocolate; lemon tastes like lemon.”
This week:
Bathhouses are vanishing at the Jersey Shore. Daytrippers, in North Wildwood, profiled by my colleague Jason Nark, charged just $5 for a shower in 2021.
Is the price for a shower in 2026:
A. $20 for adults, $5 for children under 42 inches.
B. $7 for adults, $3 for kids.
C. No change: $5.
D. $10 for everyone.
First correct answer gets a shout out.
Your Shore memory: A poem
Laurance Angelo submitted an ode, To Avalon.
It is only a walk to the bridge/though now the carpet swirl of Spring-whipped sand/bites like a raid of mosquitoes.
Once
sun burned with the taste of salt,/the hours soft as baby waves/cool as dawn tide.
Now
gulls stall in air/to hang like fixtures overhead/sea gorse crumbles and hisses.
the jettys like brown broken teeth/and broken too the half-shells/made a bracelet for the shore.
So cold/I will go back.
Send us your Shore memory! In poetry or prose, tell us how the Shore taps into something deep for you, and we will publish them in this space.
By submitting your written, visual, and/or audio contributions, you agree to The Inquirer’s Terms of Use, including the grant of rights in Section 10.
