Victorian Cape May is a seaside town like no other. The ancient ocean rolls up on her flat beaches within yards of meticulously decorated wooden homes. At holiday time, Cape May is in stark contrast to her cousin towns on the Jersey shore.
The Queen Victoria
In December, though it may be cold enough to freeze brass, you can come to Cape May and enjoy a whole new seashore experience. The summer crowds are gone, replaced by the visitors of December who come to enjoy a quieter getaway amid twinkling Christmas lights, welcoming taverns and people who are really happy to see them.
Although not a time for being barefoot on the sand, the wind and the salt air at this time of year can be invigorating! Still, a gray afternoon walk along the windy beach from the Coast Guard base to the cove can chill even the heartiest explorer. When the elements have depleted your energy and it’s time to come inside, Cape May is ready for you.
The Wooden Rabbit
With over half of Cape May’s Victorian inns and hotels staying open through December, warm comfort is easy to find. Most Cape May inns maintain working fireplaces and innkeepers who are particularly skilled in preparing special holiday treats. Surrounded by antiques, polished woodwork and the scent of fresh pastries, you can settle in to an easy chair in the parlor and know that this is Cape May in winter.
‘Tis the season to shop for gifts and Cape May accommodates. The Washington Street Mall, a pedestrian-only street three blocks long has holiday browsing not found in encased suburban mall structures. You don’t lug your coat; you wear it. Enjoy a free taste of fresh fudge and sample the decorated shop windows: toys, crafts, art prints, dolls, shoes, fashions of all kinds, sweets, jewelry and of course, fresh air.
Winterwood Gift Shop
Beyond the open mall more delightful shops pop up all over, from Beach Avenue to Washington Commons; from Congress Hall to West Cape May. Everywhere, there are specialty stores with hard-to-find crafted items, more unusual fashions, antiques and traditional seaside items. Selections run the gamut from upscale to kitsch, which makes the shopping all the more fun.
Peter Shields Inn
When you’re hungry, step into a warm tavern and mingle with other visitors from places far from shore. Or reserve a table for dinner at one of Cape May’s excellent and renowned- restaurants. Holiday dining in Cape May is as unique as the shopping. Excellent chefs, beautifully decorated dining rooms and classic menus peppered with house specialties, stand ready to satisfy and warm your holiday spirit.
Fairthorne Cottage
When darkness falls, Cape May stages a dawn of her own with thousands of Christmas lights. Gleaming windows reveal decorated trees and wreaths inside inns from Columbia and Ocean to the gazebo on Lafayette. Bundle up for a winter stroll and behind it all, if you listen past the familiar sounds of carols, you will hear the sea, Cape May’s constant companion.
— Reggie McMillan
Photographs in order of appearance: Buttonwood Manor, The Queen Victoria, The Wooden Rabbit, Winterwood Gift Shop, Peter Shields Inn and the Fairthorne Cottage B&B.
If one lives down here, one is prepared to not like anything written by outsiders about our little world. Why, you landlubbers may ask? Because they never get it right, that’s why. It’s like Hollywood trying to make a movie about the working class. The world of the working stiff is either over-romanticized or downright insulting. Lawrence Schiller does not make that mistake in his recently published book, Cape May Court House – A Death In The Night.
“Where’s the courthouse?”
After the first survey in 1703 by Shamgar’s nephew, Jeremiah Hand, the property acquired the name “Romney Marsh” from the “fertile fields of Kent county, England, the homeland of the Hands.”
when deciding to have a surprise party no invitations were issued — a simple announcement of the party was made, and everybody in the community was welcome to attend. The same was true of the prevalent beach parties — the participants often numbered a hundred or more.”
Some sit patiently waiting. Some stand — their bodies pivot, arms upraised, binoculars in hand. They speak in quiet tones like people waiting for a golfer to hit a crucial shot. It’s easy to tell the serious hawk watchers from the everyday tourist or curious spectator. For one, they have equipment. Serious equipment. Binoculars are slung around their necks. High-powered binoculars rest on adjustable tripods with high-powered names like Swarovski, the official sponsor of the Hawk Watch, Nikon and Leica.
As Mark Garland, senior naturalist at the Cape May Bird Observatory and author of Watching Nature, puts it “They come here to stop, rest and refuel. I equate it with telling a someone, ‘you have a 14 -mile run and if you stop before the 14 miles have elapsed you’re dead.’ These are not water fowl. They cannot land on water. If they do, they die.”
In warmer weather, Garland explained, the winds are generally unfavorable coming not from the west or northwest, which also ushers in a cold front, but rather from a more southerly direction.
Data collected serves as a barometer for what is happening in the whole of nature and in mankind. Garland cites as an example the noted decrease in population of the American Bald Eagle and the Peregrine Falcon back in the 50s. The decline was attributed to the use of DDT as a pesticide. Later, similar negative findings were found in the breast milk of women, also attributed to the use of DDT.
Dunne describes the observation site in 1976 not as a pristine wilderness waiting to be cultivated but a wasteland filled with discarded concrete, old utility lines, and debris from years of military construction. There was no parking lot and no roof over the pavilion. In fact, he says there wasn’t even any vegetation. The Cedars and greenery which currently surround the site have all been planted since that first Hawk Watch.
“People don’t have to turn to Antarctica or the Equator to see a great spectacle of nature,” said Dunne. “It’s right here in their own back yard. As we become more estranged from nature, there is more and more a need to integrate with nature. Here, on this observation deck, we can provide the mechanisms to bring people and nature together without the not-so-serious birder becoming intimidated.”
And the Peregrine for thousands of years was considered the “sport of kings.” It is a powerful bird and one of the fastest in world. When stalking prey, it folds itself up like a bullet and swoops down on a flock of birds to attack traveling 150-miles an hour. The Peregrines threatened extinction became the symbol for environmentalists, not only as a sign of the environmental problems which caused its decline but also a sign that solutions are possible.
It was a dark and stormy night…. well….it was dark. Desiree, our guide to ghostly apparitions, has already led us up Beach Avenue, along Jackson Street, over to the Washington Street Mall, down Ocean and, now, we stand peering up into the window of Room #10 at the Hotel Macomber, formerly the Stockton Villa, circa 1914, on Beach Avenue and Howard Street.
girl standing by the table. And we could find no explanation for this.”
“and we owned Howey’s Nursery in the Villas.” Looking for another challenge, they sold the nursery and started planting grape vines on their 10-acre Townbank Road property.
Radio broadcast of “Splendid Table.” They are not daunted by competition as new vineyards crop up. “We’d like to seem more vineyards come here and use the land for agriculture not condominiums,” she said. “There’s plenty of room for all of us. Wines are distinctive. Some may like the taste of ours and some the taste of someone else’s. We’re glad to see the other growers are planting grapes to make premium wines not hybrids.” In other words, a cheaper and mass marketable brand.
Turdo gets on the bullhorn announcing to the grape pickers that lunch is served, her husband looks over his vineyard. “It’s very hard down here because the state of New Jersey doesn’t offer the help that other states like New York and Pennsylvania do for their wine makers. I know for a fact that New York offers grants. We seem to be on our own down here.” The Turdos picked Cape May County over Long Island because of the extended growing season here and an already entrenched tourist trade. “Right here in Cape May,” said Turdo, “you have the longest growing season in New Jersey with temperatures that don’t drop below freezing until November. It’s perfect for a large variety of grapes.”
ambiance for the grounds which we intend to use for catering weddings and other functions. We’re about two years away from our first harvest. We haven’t really decided which direction we’re going.”
Blair said, it takes a long time to replace them. “My own position,” he said, “was open for two years”.
Pointing to the lush acres of grapes before her and the tractor pulling a wagon filled with buckets of White Riesling grapes, Joan Hayes, says, “Shouldn’t we do everything we can to encourage use of the land for agriculture? Don’t we have enough condominiums?”
Opinions run strong and memories deep among those whose families have lived in Cape May for the most of the 20th century. The history of Beach Avenue is rich with tales of fires, storms, innovations and a lifestyle now nearly forgotten. An 1850 street map of Cape Island shows five hotels running along the avenue. They were Congress Hall, Old Atlantic, New Atlantic, Columbia House, and the Mansion House. The next year, 1851, Cape Island incorporated and became Cape Island City. According to The Summer City by the Sea, by Emil R. Salvini, the Cape Island Turnpike Company laid out a road connecting the steamboat terminus to Cape May in 1852, known today as Sunset Boulevard.
which coincided with a full moon and high tide, again destroyed thirteen blocks of the boardwalk spewing debris all along Beach Avenue, and marked the end of a the traditional wooden boardwalk. A concrete promenade was built in its place along Beach Avenue with a sea wall to try to protect the beach front from future storms. The ’62 Nor’easter proved to be a precursor for many other changes that were to affect the way Beach Avenue would look.
t Beach and Howard. It was a place for teenagers to go. They had a Ping-Pong table, a soda fountain. This was in the 40s. They had dances and a woman who ran it kept an eye on everyone. I was there every night. And where the movie theater is, used to be a McPherson’s Horse Back Riding. That would have been in the ’30s and early ’40s. I used to love to go there too.”
To call fishing a pastime, or hobby, is an understatement in Cape May . For many, it’s an entire life. Families live by the sea — their livelihood dependent on Mother Nature’s good will. Their lifestyles are different, reliant on weather, tides, seasons.
The ability to keep a fish depends on size. The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) in Massachusetts sets limitation on various species which are over-fished or likewise, under-fished. Serving as a sort of scale, the NMFS promotes ecological balance deep beneath the waves. A current point of issue is a proposed ban on catching white marlin. For tournament and sports fishing, this ban is an annoyance and inconvenience which could also be financially devastating to some sports fishing captains and marinas. These captains make their living from charters. And here in Cape May , the South Jersey Marina hosts the Mid-Atlantic $500,000 tournament — the marlin most sought after. Fortunately, most fishermen understand the need for regulations — the striped bass being a prime example.
As the non-fisherman-type, I should be lauded by the NMFS. If I had to live on the fish I catch, well, you’d all be saying your adieus to me. I went once on what’s called “the mackerel trip”. It’s the first catch of the spring season, and sports fishermen stock up on mackerel to use as bait for the summer season. Each rod is loaded — I know that’s the wrong lingo, but what the heck — with six or seven, even up to nine hooks and fish are hauled in such. It’s a lot of hard work, but well worth the effort. Summer charters mean money.
In a 1996 article, the New York Times called The Sea Mist “the architectural equivalent of a Sousa march.” Fitting if one takes into consideration composition, transition and above all, an era. Built as part of the 1873 Cape May Beach Land Company’s marketing promotion, lots along the beachfront were sold for as little as $1.00 in effort to settle the area. Not far down Beach Avenue, John Philip Sousa was playing his “Congress Hall March” in front of summer guests — visitors enjoying cool sea breezes at the height of a hot summer. Families who might consider owning a summer house as an indispensable retreat.
The Sea Mist today looms large on the Cape May beachfront. Whether viewed from land or sea, this red and white “steamboat-style” building with its unique widow’s walk is one of Cape May’s most photographed houses. Originally two stories tall, and used as a summer house, its subsequent nine owners built upwards and around and behind the building each adding his own “harmonic chord.” One can see the different stages of outside development through its porches and windows and inside still stand one section of the original dove-tailed wooden exterior.
A summer house well into the 1960s, subsequent owners turned the building into efficiencies and apartments delighting guests with ocean front views and summer breezes. Current and tenth owner Fernando Tamilio continues this tradition each year improving and upgrading the building’s efficiencies and apartments and have now turned it into a year-round facility promoting the off-season as well as the summer.
They call the building “the Miracle on Beach Avenue.”
The Sea Mist is decorated year-round for Christmas with lights and angels and trees. Said Fernando, “The town and Sea Mist are even more spectacular at Christmas time. We offer a Christmas special hoping families can take advantage of off-season events, tours and shopping.”
Another special plan of Fernando’s is to join Cape May’s ghost tour. For yes, according to Fernando, the building is haunted. “You either believe or you don’t,” he said, “but from what I’ve experienced here, I believe.”
Truly a Cape May landmark, The Sea Mist reminds one of the Cape May of yore. The old-time ambience, the smell of the ocean air mingling with bed linens, children happily — albeit tiredly — returning from a day at the beach.
