Beachin' with Bonnie… and her Babes

Navigating our Local Beaches with Ataraxia

While our previous favorite local beach was getting renovated, me and my three babes explored a bunch of other sandy day getaways. Check out our take on them, and my tips, tricks, and gear for a great beach day in the Washington DC region. In the summer of 2023, seven year old Perry will give his take on some of the places he will get to revisit during camp.

North Beach

We begin our local beach adventures at North Beach, MD. Lucky for us it is a beautiful weekend (my birthday weekend!) for March and the weather treated us to 70 degrees and partly cloudy. The beach was about an hour drive for us.

Plenty of play quality of sand

As it was off-season we had a few advantages. No fees, easy parking, uncrowded, and not hot enough to need a shade structure.

View from my chair of the wooden pirate ship play structure. There’s only one way to enter and exit this part of the beach.

What we liked:

  • Sandy beach, some light pebbly areas with little shells, but enough space for toes to tease the sand.
  • Playground on the beach… probably my kids’ favorite part. A pirate ship with a few swings, slide, and plenty of time-consuming playtime.
  • Small walkable town. Cute shops a block from the beach/boardwalk. Thoroughly enjoyed my floral ‘Lavendar Fog’ and hubs liked his Matcha Latte at the bakist.
  • Bathrooms in decent shape and close to the beach. Also has outdoor showers to rinse off.
  • Well kept boardwalk. Lots of pavilions and peers to explore and hang out.
  • Beach is fairly contained, which makes relaxing while the babes play more possible.
  • We didn’t go in, but the water looks shallow. That’s a worry-free feature for our non-swimming babes.
  • Off-season so we couldn’t enjoy, but a couple of places to get crabs to eat or take home.
A few showers and changing rooms next to the women’s restroom

Not a fan of:

  • Fees during the regular season. ($25/adult is a major turn-off. If we came back in April it would cost this family of four $70 total)
  • It is not small but not large, so I imagine it gets pretty crowded during the high season, which would limit parking, availability, and sand real estate.
  • Ice cream options seemed meh. Little babe was happy with her Dole ice cream from Jango’s, but I will only use the calories towards ice cream I can’t buy in store.
  • Limited options for food to takeaway.
  • Lots of rules. While I am happy that you can’t have people smoking on the beach, there is a massive amount of rules, and one in particular might scare us away- no canopies/shade structures. If that’s a requirement, plan to have a chair with the built-in kind or an umbrella.
Pavilian next to the beach entrance, one of the couple of peers seen on the left. Nice quality decking, good for bare feet.

Concluding thoughts….

We enjoyed our time there, but the fees and limited size for anticipated crowds will probably keep us coming during the nice off-season days when its free to visit. If you are a county resident, active military, have kids 2 and under the price is not so bad. Not a beach but maybe one day we will check out the nearby waterpark.

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