Day 124 - Atlantic City

Again we were waiting for high tide before heading to Atlantic City.  Captain Randy went up to the marina boat supply store while I cooked breakfast and worked on the blog.  The internet in the bath house was fast so I could post a couple entries.  It was very warm, humid and breezy.  We were on our way through the harbor, past the Coast Guard Station, to the Cape May Inlet by 11:05 am.  To the port, under a bridge is the NJ ICW.  It is reportedly shallow with the tendency to shoal so we were taking the ocean.

 

 

The waves were 2-3 feet on the ocean, not bad as the wind was from the south.  The shoreline from here to Ocean City is built up with smaller hotels and beach houses.  There were a series of amusement parks at Wildwood, a few miles north of the Inlet.  The hotels get bigger at Ocean City and we could see the high-rise hotels and casinos ahead at Atlantic City.  Both of these cities have Ferris wheels and other rides visible from the water. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At the southeast corner of the Abescon Inlet is a tall, thin structure that loomed like a big screen TV from the boat.  We found out later that this is the Revel, a hotel/casino costing over $1B to construct.  It has changed hands a few times due to financial difficulties and is about to go to auction again in September.  This beauty might have been ahead of its time and surely suffered from the economic downturn starting in 2008.  The Absecon lighthouse is on our port as we turn into the harbor.

 

We pulled into the Farley Marina, right next to the Golden Nugget Casino Hotel at 1:40 pm.  This is another very large marina with 600 slips.  There are several megayachts here.  The boat that is 2 slips down from us has a gold Looper’s burgee, but we have not seen the owner’s yet.  We have seen only a few loopers on this leg.  Either they are further north already or stating at other marinas (or anchoring out).

Neither the Captain nor I had been to Atlantic City before.  The main attraction was the boardwalk and the beach.  We caught a cab outside the casino and said we wanted to go to the boardwalk.  The driver dropped us off in the “middle” of it.  There are walkways to the beach all along the boardwalk and there is NO charge for going to the beach here; a definite positive for Atlantic City.  On the other hand, the casinos and shopping pier we went into were not in the best of shape, with many vacant shops and closed off areas.  We were amused by the "indoor beach" inside the shopping pier.  The boardwalk itself is dominated by T-shirt shops, fortune tellers, massage salons and fast food.  The big chains are here, such as Hard Rock Café, House of Blues, Margaritaville, Johnny Rockets, etc.  It all seemed a bit on the tawdry side to us.  That said, neither of us are gamblers and that may have influenced us too.  I certainly would not call Atlantic City a “charming seaport town”!

 

 

 

We did enjoy watching the second half of the US vs. Belgium World Cup match at Bally’s, although we were sad when the team lost.  The Captain found a shop to buy salt water taffy but we did not buy anything else.  We decided to take a cab back to the Golden Nugget and have dinner in the Chart House, overlooking the harbor and marina.  Our waiter was quite talkative and gave us the “low-down” on the Revel and who the possible bidders would be at the September auction.  When asked how he thought Atlantic City was, he said “It’s on life support”.  He thought the 2 major reasons for this were:  the surrounding states built casinos so no one needed to come to AC to gamble anymore;  the state would not allow the casinos to have a “Sports Book” (gambling on sporting events).  In his opinion there are too many private “bookies” that would stand to lose if the casinos took it over.  Outside of the beach and casinos, there is not much else fueling the economy here.  We had another great seafood dinner as well as gaining a local perspective on Atlantic City.

 

 

A rock band was playing on the outdoor deck and we could hear it very well on the boat as we settled in for the night.