The special pleasures of autumn at the shore

Vickie and Todd Swiontek of Lancaster County returned to Cape May Point Saturday to celebrate their 18th wedding anniversary and found the scenes only September can bring.

"Our anniversary is actually in August, but we decided to wait until September, said Vickie, who is 55 and a part-time paralegal. "The water is warmer and there are fewer people. Most of the restaurants in Cape May are open. And it doesn't matter to us if a couple of T-shirt shops on the boardwalk are closed."

Aspire as we may to free-wheeling independence, most of us live as slaves to the clock and the calendar. Only the few and the fortunate manage to get away in the fall.

Families with school-age children head home from the shore on Labor Day and college-bound lifeguards return to their respective campuses in mid-August. As a result, tourism officials have to trump up all manner of fests and festivals - from a boardwalk Aerobatic Airshow in Ocean City to Monster Truck Expo in Wildwood and Chowderfest on Long Beach Island - to draw crowds after Labor Day.

But the Swionteks, who left their 15-year-old at home with her grandmother, need none of that.

"We like to sleep in and go out for brunch," Vickie Swinotek said Saturday. She and Todd, who is 45 and a banker, hunted for collectibles too.

Just about every shore town shifts somewhat come September. The air itself seems to exhale. And for city dwellers facing the inevitability of winter, autumn at the shore is a cozier kind of vacation.

"There's a certain nostalgia with time spent at the beach, and people want to recapture that," says Gary Chasen, who rents out his Harvey Cedars home in the heat of summer but saves September for himself.

"You can go to Europe and stay in the finest hotels," Chasen says, "but I don't think there is any substitute for spending time relaxing at the beach."

"September is the nicest part of the year," says Chasen. "The water is warm, the beaches are in pristine condition, and all the stores have sales going on. You can get great buys."

Rents are reduced too. A $3,000 week in August becomes a $1,200 week in the fall. And the beach fees vanish with the lifeguards.

Chuck Pedrick grew up in Surf City on Long Beach Island and remembers when everything shut down after Labor Day.

"That was it," said Pedrick, who was biking Saturday in Cape May (not the point) with his wife, Lynne. The couple had come down for the weekend and stayed at a bed and breakfast.

"Back then, on Labor Day, summer was over. Nobody came down on the weekends after that. All this is new."

For the Swionteks, Cape May Point scores as a place to soak up the last of summer without missing nature's fall foliage show. The town is heavily-wooded, so autumn here brings as brilliant a display of red, amber and orange as the Poconos.

Todd Swiontek drove the couple's Ford F-150 here from Lancaster County, towing both their bicycles and his '1982 Yamaha Vinago 750. But they did lots of walking yesterday - on the beach, and around town to admire the Victorian villas, quaint cottages, and doll-house size bungalows the locals refer to as "the littles."

The Point has a lake, a bird sanctuary, a lighthouse, state park, and a post office. But no hotels, no shops, and no restaurants.

"People either get it immediately or they don't get it and they never come back," says Denise Coleman who owns the cedar-shingled cottage the Swionteks rented this weekend. "Maybe those people need the Stone Harbor or Avalon lifestyle."

The Colemans, she's 47 and he's 60, who live in northwestern New Jersey across from Easton most of the year, bought this cottage in 1987 when it was a shack that didn't even have indoor plumbing. Dale restored the mahogany porch,the plaster walls and the douglas fir on the floors indoor. Denise worked on the garden, adding native plants that attact hummingbirds and butterflies. It took grand prize in the town's 2008 competition.

Knowing that was a particular pleasure for Vickie Swinotek, who is an apprentice in a master gardening program.

Birders flock to Cape May Point from around the word because it is happily situated in one of the best migration corridors on the planet, says Pete Dunne of the NJ Audubon Society. He was on a platform at the state park yesterday, pointing out certain hawks to visitors.

"It's the equivalent of having the Grand Canyon in your backyard," Dunne said.

As many as 1,000 hawks a day pass by here, Dunne says, and they're easy to watch because, "they keep bankers' hours. You can see them from 9-5."

Migrating songbirds, on the other hand, do their thing at sunrise.

All good things come to an end sooner or later and in the Wildwoods, that's after Columbus Day when the piers close. But for now, even the biking is better.

"In season, you can only bike on the boardwalk until 11 a.m.," says Ben Rose of the Greater Wildwoods Tourism and Convention Authority.

"After Labor Day, there are no restrictions."

Reach Inquirer staff writer Dianna Marder at 215-854-4211 or dmarder@phillynews.com. Read her recent work at http://go.philly.com/diannamarder.