It is almost summer! Here on the East Coast, temperatures have soared into the 80s and 90s and we have been treated to a string of seemingly endless sunny days. We recently spent a week at the Jersey shore with friends and were treated to magnificent weather. Add to it gorgeous weather for a cultural festival, along with blue skies for a fun family meetup in a nearby city, and we have had zero weather-related complaints!
So come along then, as we spent some time at the beach, eat and drink our way through a cool festival, and discover one of the most awesome coffee shops I have ever visited.
Let’s begin:
Sea Isle City 2026
As we have for many previous years, my wife and I informally kicked off our summer with a week in Sea Isle City, New Jersey. This year we shared a beachfront house with friends, enjoying all that the Jersey Shore has to offer!We began our vacation with lunch at the Deauville Inn, a great restaurant and bar on the banks of Strathmere Bay.Cheers to vacation!We started lunch with a calamari and shrimp appetizer. It was excellent. What was less than excellent was the strong winds that continuously blew throughout our meal. It was the danger of sitting outside – a few times I had to go chasing our napkins to keep them from blowing into the bay!While I devoured a crab cake sandwich, my wife thoroughly enjoyed her Crab Cobb Salad (crab salad, greens, avocado, bacon, cherry tomato, egg, and avocado ranch dressing. Fueled up, we headed off to our rental house to move in for a week!Our friends were flying in from out of town, so we had to bring enough supplies for five adults and two children to comfortably spend a week at the shore. Enter Grace, our 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokee, and her 68.3 cubic feet of cargo capacity. We put every single square inch to use on the drive down.This would be our view for the week. Unfortunately, a few days before our trip I had come down with the worst sinus infection I have had in years. It certainly put a damper on my enjoyment, but then again, if you’re going to be sick, at least be sick with this view!I’ll be honest, being sick kept my wife and I from engaging in the types of adventures you’ve become accustomed to seeing on the blog. Less hiking adventures and more coffee with a view this year.Sinus infection or no sinus infection, there was no way I was missing dinner from Mike’s Seafood, a Sea Isle City institution. Excellent, as always.Fortunately, if I wasn’t able to go out for amazing views, Mother Nature was happy to bring them to our front door.Like I said, not a bad view while sitting on the porch and coughing…Surprisingly, I saw only a handful of osprey in the air, none of which tried to pose for my camera. I resorted to practicing with seagulls.So numerous are gulls that, after a lifetime at the Jersey shore, I kind of take them for granted. They do make for some cool photographic subjects, however.One somewhat rare sighting were a pair of brown pelicans – it’s pretty early in the summer to see these guys in New Jersey.Hello little cardinal. You might not be as big as some of the other birds I photographed, but thanks for posing for me!While I might not have felt up for going on long adventures, I certainly was happy to put my drone aloft and bring back some photos!Looking westward toward the setting sun reminded me of just how narrow Sea Isle City is!Perhaps my favorite photo from the entire trip – a sunset over the wetlands to the west of Sea Isle City.Toward the end of the week, I felt well enough that my wife and I were able to have a date night out at a nice restaurant. We chose Sole, an upscale Italian restaurant in Sea Isle.We started with a calamari and shrimp appetizer. Fully gluten-free, this dish was absolutely fantastic.While my wife enjoyed the grilled bronzino, I chowed down on the linguine pescatore – linguine, shrimp, calamari, little neck clams, and marinara sauce. Our meal was excellent – I would highly recommend a visit to Sole if you are in town.We also discovered a new coffee shop on island. Cafe 4109 is excellent. We were thrilled with our almond milk (left) and oat milk (right) lattes.Owing to my illness, it was a bit of an unusual year at the shore, but we all still had a wonderful time. Til next time, Sea Isle!
TurkishFest 2026
One of the aspects of living in New Jersey that I greatly appreciate is the diversity of our state. You can often find cultural festivals each weekend, and my wife and I recently decided to stop by TurkishFest 2026, an annual gathering of the Turkish-American community in our area.The festival features arts and crafts, along with live music and performances. One of the performances we enjoyed was seeing kids showcasing what they’ve learned of the Whirling Dervish dance.The primary reason we came was the food! We each enjoyed a kabob lunch before we began searching for dessert! One really cool bonus? Every vendor selling food had the ingredients displayed at their stands.At one stand offering baked goods, I drooled over the seven-layer honey cake. I mentioned to the woman running the stand that, as delicious as it looked, I would feel bad eating the cake in front of my wife, as it wasn’t gluten free. “Wait a moment,” the lady said and then pulled out a gluten-free version of the same cake. She also gave me a small slip of paper listing all of her ingredients. My wife and I devoured this in about 2.5 seconds.Of course, what Turkish festival would be complete without a cup of Turkish coffee?I absolutely love Turkish coffee – my father-in-law introduced me to it after he befriended the owner of a Turkish coffee shop in Minneapolis. It is brewed unfiltered with finely ground beans. The result is a delicious, robust, fragrant coffee. It made a lovely treat to end our visit to the festival!
Lunch and a Cool Coffee Shop in Bethlehem, PA
On a recent Saturday morning we set off to meet family for lunch in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. With sunny skies and temperatures in the 80s, it made for a pleasant drive.Although we had visited Bethlehem several times, this was our first time in the historic downtown section. We stashed the TLX in an (affordable) street parking spot.Our chosen meetup point? Fegley’s Bethlehem Brew Works, a restaurant and brewery that first opened in 1998.The drinks were great and the food was quite enjoyable! I devoured the Brewers’ Grain Fed Burger, served with a side of hot and crispy fries.Fegley’s also has a separate gluten-free menu available upon request, and my wife thoroughly enjoyed the turkey burger on a gluten free bun with a side of coleslaw. It was a fun lunch, and after saying goodbye to our relatives, we decided to explore a bit of downtown.In search of a post-lunch treat, we stopped by a coffee shop down the block… and discovered an awesome new spot!Bitty and Beau’s is a chain of coffee shops staffed by individuals with developmental and intellectual disabilities. They have locations in numerous states along the East Coast and the South. When you order your coffee, you are given a playing card – when your card is called, your coffee is ready!And what excellent coffee it was! Both of our lattes were absolutely fantastic – we will definitely visit again! Bitty & Beau’s has locations in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Maryland, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Texas, Ohio, and Arizona. If you have a chance to stop by, definitely check it out!
Garage… and Other… Updates
First, we experienced a slight hiccup with Grace, my wife’s 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokee. The aftermarket alternator we had installed earlier this spring failed after only a few weeks of work. We ended up working with the shop to have a new Jeep-brand alternator installed as a replacement (note to self: this is what I should have done initially), and all now seems well. Grace now has over 134,000 miles on her odometer. Onward!Meanwhile, my Acura TLX continues its quest for 100,000 miles. 75k is now in the books. Onward!Finally, our felines are doing quite well. Betty continues to be a little ball of love, and Mikko (pictured) brings us much joy with his antics and playfulness.
Wrapping Up
While the season of summer does not begin until June 21, Memorial Day weekend is the unofficial kickoff for beach vacations, road trips, and time outdoors. The beginning of June has already offered several great opportunities for summer fun! Stay tuned to this blog, as we have some cool summer road trips planned!
Thanks, as always, for coming along on another journey down the open road ahead.
