Celebrating 50

Some friends and I celebrated our 50th birthdays last weekend in Ocean City New Jersey. From left to right there is Beth (June 11), Marian (December 16), Me(December 15) and Maryann(January 7). If you have to be 50, we figured, you might as well have fun.

Marian, Maryann and I headed down together on Friday afternoon. We arrived at the Scarborough Inn about 3:30 and headed to the beach right after checking in. We had adjoining rooms at the inn with a shared bathroom between. It was the perfect set up for a group such as ours. We enjoyed about 2 hours on the beach including a long walk until the skies opened up and poured buckets. We quickly returned to our rooms for 'real' showers and to dress for dinner. Marian had a message from Beth on her cell. She couldn't retrieve the message (having not figured out how to work her new Iphone just yet) so she simply called Beth back only to discover that Beth decided to wait until the morning to arrive. She was responsible for brining her sister Winnie and their niece Denise to Denise's father's house farther out on the island. The rain back home had closed the Schyukill and she was concerned. We let her know that breakfast was at 8 if she could make it.

So the three of us tried to go to a restaurant that Marian knew over the 9th street bridge. But the bridge was closed. We never did find out why (we had arrived that way earlier) and it was a bit disconcerting to know that one of the two ways off the island was closed. So we went over 34th street to a place called Yesterdays where there was an hour wait. It was already 7 so when we were finally seated we settled for salads. Maryann was able to have the oysters she wanted and Marian desparately needed coffee. She had come home the night before from a week at boyscout camp! All three of us, embarassingly, or maybe because we were closer to 50 than we realized, were in bed before 10:30.

The next morning was gorgeous. In fact, Saturday was THE perfect day at the shore. Breakfast is served at the Inn at 8:00. We were on the porch waiting at 7:30. Beth showed up a few minutes before 8 and we all went to breakfast together. We were down on the beach by 9:30 and stayed until almost 6! We had a lovely long walk, went in the ocean twice(!), there were perfect body surfing waves, read our books, did a group crossword puzzle (without phoning a friend for help!). It was soooooooooooo relaxing and fun. Maryann and I both said we would like to have the nerve to parasail. In fact, if I had said yes Maryann would have done it. But I'm still not ready. We did write down the phone number though.

On the way down and back from the beach we had to pass a house that was also celebrating a 50th birthday. I wanted to appropriate a balloon for us but Beth said she didn't want to have to go to the police station for grand theft balloon! It wouldn't have worked anyway... turns out the balloons had Billy's name on the other side so they would have known I took it. Marian suggested we crash the party later. We could tell "Billy" that we were old high school girlfiends that he forgot about. We were the right age after all. We didn't do that either. We talk big but deep down we are good girls.

After an absolutely gorgeous day on the beach we went back to the rooms to shower and change. We headed up to the boardwalk and ate at Ove's. I've walked by the place a million times and didn't realize what a great restaurant was inside. I thought they just rented bikes and sold donuts. We had a great dinner followed by a stroll on the boardwalk. We were going to get one of those Old Tyme Photos... you know where you dress up in clothes and they take your picture. But for 4 of us and to get a copy of each turned out to be more than we wanted to spend. To make up for that we took this photo the next day by the music pier.

The boardwalk was typically mobbed on a Saturday night so we decided to go back to the inn and play games on the porch and go back to the board walk on Sunday before leaving. We played Wise & Unwise and Upwords until midnight. We all agreed we had not laughed that hard in a long while!

We had breakfast the next morning, packed up the car, checked out and headed for the boardwalk for some strolling and window shopping. We took Maryann out to the Sindia marker and then had lunch at a new restaurant on the board walk called Clancy's. We ate outside. I happened to go inside before our meal was served (that's were the restrooms were) and saw on the TV over the bar that there was a major rain storm coming! The headline banner said the Schuykill was closed again! And sure enough just as we finished eating the rains came. We were soaked again by the time we returned to the car. The roads were flooded and it was raining so hard that when we took Beth back to her brother in laws house (where she was staying the rest of the week) we stopped there and waited for the rain to thin out.

It was a great weekend. I highly recommend celebrating with friends. And if you are looking for a really nice B&B in Ocean City, the Scarborough is really nice!