1,000 Places to See in the U.S.A. & Canada Before You Die (27 page)

New Jersey

The Jersey Shore is a state of mind. If you’re from the Garden State, it’s a continuum that stretches from childhood beach weekends through college-age road trips and then right on back to vacationing with your own kids
. The original reason people started going “down the shore” (and still one of the main reasons today) is simple: humidity. In summer, the New York/New Jersey metropolitan area turns into one giant steam room, sending residents hightailing it to the Jersey Shore’s nearly 130 miles of beaches. Resorts and boardwalk entertainment districts boomed beginning in the late 19th century, and today the shore is a glorious mishmash, from hard-partying seaside bars, famous rock ’n’ roll clubs, and neon-lit boardwalk Americana to family-oriented beaches, beautiful lighthouses, and a whole galaxy of motels, inns, and summer rental properties.

A classic example of Doo-Wop architecture.

The boardwalk towns are the heart of it all. Down south, near the very tip of the shore, Wildwood boasts a 38-block boardwalk with huge amusement piers, waterparks, carnival and arcade games, souvenir shops, tattoo parlors, pizza and funnel-cake stands, tram cars, and everything else you’d want from a great American boardwalk—including Skee-Ball, the classic arcade game that’s a cross between bowling, bocce ball, and darts. On one side of
the boardwalk, Wildwood’s white sand beach is nearly half a mile wide in places, and packed with families throughout the summer months. On the other side, the town is full of beautifully preserved “Doo-Wop” architecture, a 1950s style that mixes space-age angularity with Caribbean and Hawaiian tiki motifs. With more than 200 Doo-Wop motels, restaurants, and shops, Wildwood is the grand high mecca of the style, and it’s even got a preservation league and architectural tours to prove it.

Twenty-five miles to the north, Ocean City’s boardwalk offers a calmer, more polite version of the same, with roller coasters, games, miniature golf, and the Spanish-style Ocean City Music Pier, which dates to 1928 and still offers everything from the Ocean City Pops to the Miss New Jersey Pageant—as good as pageantry gets in the Garden State since Miss America recently left Atlantic City for Vegas.

Considerably farther north, only about 90 minutes from New York City, Seaside Heights completes the trilogy of active boardwalks, advertising itself as “Your home for family fun since 1913!” Perched on a narrow barrier island between the Atlantic and Barnegat Bay, with only about four blocks from shore to shore, the town has a mile-long boardwalk that’s brimming with rides, games of chance, cotton candy and sausage stands, and raw bars. At the Casino Amusement Arcade, the wooden 1910 Dr. Floyd L. Moreland Carousel is one of America’s great remaining carousels, with hand-carved animals, 2,000 lightbulbs, and a 1923 Wurlitzer Military Band Organ providing the irreplaceable sound track.

Another kind of sound track—arguably the unofficial anthem of New Jersey—got its start even farther north, in Asbury Park. A major resort city from 1870 until WWII, Asbury had experienced such a palpable decline by the early 1970s that its mood influenced local boy Bruce Springsteen’s songs of desperation and redemption, spawning the “Born to Run” New Jersey zeitgeist. You can still hear the Asbury Park sound at the Stone Pony, a legendary rock club where Springsteen has made scores of appearances over the past 30 years, sometimes solo, sometimes sitting in with a local band.

W
HERE:
from Cape May in the south to Sandy Hook in the north.
Wildwoods visitor info:
Tel 609-846-2631;
www.wildwoodsnj.com
.
Ocean City visitor info:
Tel 800-BEACH-NJ or 609-399-1412;
www.njoceancity.com
.
Seaside Heights visitor info:
Tel 800-SEA-SHORE or 732-793-1510;
www.seasideheightstourism.com
.
D
OO
-W
OP
T
ROLLEY
T
OURS:
Wildwood. Tel 609-884-5404;
www.doowopusa.org
.
When:
late June–Aug.
S
TONE
P
ONY:
Asbury Park. Tel 732-502-0600;
www.stoneponyonline.com
.
W
HERE TO
S
TAY:
The StarLux, Wildwood. Tel 609-522-7412;
www.thestarlux.com
.
Cost:
from $69 (off-peak), from $199 (peak).
B
EST TIMES
: mid-Apr for Ocean City’s comedy-themed Doo-Dah Parade; late May for the giant Wildwoods International Kite Festival; late Oct for Wildwood’s Fabulous Fifties Weekend (
www.fabfifties.com
).

The Unknown Jersey Shore

New Jersey

Spring Lake is only about 5 miles down the shore from Asbury Park (see above), but it might as well be on another planet. It has a beach, but it’s a quiet, peaceful, litter-free beach, with room to spread out and laze
.
It’s got a boardwalk too, but it’s glitz-free, with nary a fast-food vendor or neon sign to be seen. Most folks are just out for a stroll or pedaling along on bicycles built for two, and maybe heading to Susan Murphy’s or Hoffman’s for an ice cream cone.

Founded in the late 19th century as a summer destination for New Yorkers and Philadelphians fleeing city humidity, Spring Lake developed into an upscale, quiet, mostly residential community. In town, the large, spring-fed namesake lake is stocked with ducks and surrounded by floral displays and walking paths, while nearby Third Avenue offers a shopping district full of small boutiques and interesting gift shops. On tree-lined streets, well-kept homes boast wraparound porches, big windows, and turreted roofs so emblematic of late 19th-century resort style.

Though it’s primarily a residential town, Spring Lake offers several wonderful inns and restaurants. Located right across the street from the boardwalk, the Breakers is a classic Victorian beachfront resort, with its boxy five-story architecture and long covered porch. Inside, 73 rooms have kept up with the 21st century, offering whirlpool baths and fireplaces. Three blocks north and a few doors inland, Sea Crest by the Sea is regularly chosen as New Jersey’s most romantic B&B, an 1885 Victorian whose eight large, themed guest rooms offer fireplaces, Jacuzzis, balconies, and big beds. To the south, across from the ocean and near the tip of the lake, the Sandpiper Inn’s downstairs restaurant, the Black Trumpet, is acclaimed for the cooking of chef co-owner Mark Mikolajczyk. Menus favor seafood and the freshest ingredients, prepared in an exacting style that shows off the chef’s training as an intern for New York City’s celebrated David Bouley.

It’s just a short walk to the beach from the Sea Crest by the Sea.

W
HERE
: 65 miles south of New York City.
Visitor info:
Tel 732-449-0577;
www.springlake.org
.
T
HE
B
REAKERS:
Tel 732-449-7700;
www.breakershotel.com
.
Cost:
from $100 (off-peak), from $220 (peak).
S
EA
C
REST
: Tel 800-803-9031 or 732-449-9031;
www.seacrestbythesea.com
.
Cost:
from $310 (off-peak), from $360 (peak).
B
LACK
T
RUMPET:
Tel 732-449-4700;
www.theblacktrumpet.com
.
Cost:
dinner $45.
B
EST TIMES
: Tues in Aug for concerts in the park.

Hot Meals, Cool Decor, and a Waitress Named Jeannie

New Jersey

The diner is an archetypal New Jersey icon, keeping the tradition of greasy burgers, any-hour breakfasts, and home-baked pies alive. First appearing as horse-drawn lunch wagons that made the rounds of factories in the 1870s
, diners eventually grew roots in working-class neighborhoods nationwide. In the early 20th century, companies started manufacturing them in prefabricated kits, and by the ’30s,
you could pick your diner out of a catalog, send a check, and get the whole thing delivered to you—stools, stoves, dishes, and all—in about three months.

Of the ten major diner manufacturers, six were based in New Jersey, making the state the unofficial classic diner capital of America. Ideally, a classic diner should be prefab; it should be long and narrow like a railroad dining car (after which they were originally patterned); it should have a counter with stools (with leatherette booths optional); it should serve comfort food, preferably 24 hours a day; and it should be old, with as much of its original decor intact as possible.

The industrial areas of northern New Jersey, beginning just west of lower Manhattan and Staten Island and spreading inland for about ten miles, are a diner lover’s mecca. Start at the White Mana in Jersey City, which began life at the 1939 World’s Fair and claims to be the original fast-food restaurant. It’s round, with a circular counter and tile floor, and serves legendarily tasty burgers. (A second White Manna—squarishly shaped and retaining the chain’s original spelling—survives in Hackensack.) Not far from Manna and flanked by highways on all sides, the Bendix Diner dates from 1947 and is a regular stop for Jerseyites returning from Manhattan after a night out. A steel rectangle with a can’t-miss neon sign, it’s essentially unchanged since the day it opened. The same can’t be said for the nearby Tick Tock Diner, which is regularly named as Jersey’s best—some years ago its original 1949 exterior was covered over with an ugly chrome. The huge menu remains, as does the clock on the roof, surrounded by the diner’s insightful motto: “Eat Heavy.”

To the south, in East Orange, the doublesize Harris Diner represents the move into the 1950s. It wins plaudits for its original steel-and-chrome exterior, its food, its booths with their individual jukeboxes, and its old-school waitresses.

Back in Jersey City, the Miss America Diner is another ’50s-era chrome-and-steel classic with a block-lettered neon sign on top and good, solid food within. For a last treat on your tour, head inland to the Summit Diner, built in 1938. It’s got a railroad-car exterior, deco lettering, and a wood-paneled interior with booths on one side and a long counter on the other. It’s easy to imagine some down-on-his-luck character straight out of a Frank Capra movie slouched here during the Depression, having donuts and coffee.

W
HERE
: northern New Jersey.
C
OST:
under $10.
W
HITE
M
ANA:
Jersey City. Tel 201-963-1441.
W
HITE
M
ANNA:
Hackensack. Tel 201-342-0914.
B
ENDIX
D
INER:
Hasbrouck Heights. Tel 201-288-0143.
T
ICK
T
OCK
D
INER:
Clifton. Tel 973-777-0511.
H
ARRIS
D
INER:
East Orange. Tel 973-675-9703.
M
ISS
A
MERICA
D
INER:
Jersey City. Tel 201-333-5468.
S
UMMIT
D
INER:
Summit. Tel 908-277-3256.

An Aristocratic College Town

New Jersey

New Jersey’s Princeton University and its namesake town have a similar feel—
in
but not
of
the Garden State—existing as part of the American aristocracy’s great old-money diaspora, full of Colonial-era architecture
, leafy parks, and manicured gardens, all overlaid with the energy of a busy college town.