Steve Jasiecki, chairman of Sustainable Margate, holds a baby terrapin in the environmental science tent at Beachstock.
MARGATE - The weather was perfect for a day at the beach. The City of Margate and Margate Business Association held their annual Beachstock: The Planet's Biggest Beach Party, Saturday, June 25 in the park and on the beach behind the Margate Public Library. The annual celebration welcomes residents and visitors from near and far to open the summer beach season in style.
The party offered plenty of entertainment for adults and children, food concessions, adult beverage tents and a fun way to learn about the marine life that lives on the beach and in the ocean and bay.
Sustainable Margate, the city's green team, provided youngsters with the opportunity to learn about the terrapins that climb out of the bay to lay their eggs on higher ground. Project Terrapin, an educational initiative of the Marine Academy of Technology and Environmental Science in Barnegat Bay, provided information about the threats to female terrapins emerging from the bay to build their nests. Children had the opportunity to pet a live terrapin and see them at different stages of growth.
For the first time ever, the Mummers played music on the beach.
"This is our first time on the beach," Jersey String Band Capt. Pat Walton said. "Last year in the Mummers Parade, our theme was a beach theme."
The band has been together since 2018, Walton said, and includes many of the band members from the former Broomall String Band, which disbanded. They are centered in the West Deptford area.
Brothers Matt and Garrett Broad who grew up in Marlton, were visiting Beachstock for the first time. Matt, who lives in California, is in town to visit his mother, who has a place in Ventnor, and Garret was with Jane Stetz, who is visiting from Buffalo, New York.
"If someone told me I would fall in love with the Jersey shore, I would have never believed them," she said. "We love it here. We'll come every year."
Matt Broad said their mom is downsizing but plans to stay in the area, and the brothers are considering going in on the purchase of a condo.
"We love the Jersey shore," he said.
Vaiva Daunoraite of Northfield was with friends who were visiting from Chicago.
"My friends are in town so we thought we would come and check it out," she said. "This is great, awesome."
The party would continue into the evening hours with more entertainment, a bonfire and a screening of a children's movie.
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