A mid-week vacation day is the easiest. Oh, and you’ll need your resident beach sticker. We prepped our car with a picnic blanket for the seat, extra towels, and ice waters. Start early and grab a big “lobsterjack” breakfast because you’ll need the fuel. End late.
Let’s establish some base rules here.
First off, you need to spend at least 15 minutes at each beach. (You can tweak this a little if you want.) Next, you need to dive under. We suggest a ritual for each beach, e.g. ‘The Five and Dive’. Finally, you have to stop for ice cream and candy. Remember, you can do these beaches (or others in Gloucester) and jumps in any order. Be flexible for unexpected delays like staying at one beach for hours, or a friend asking you to drop off a sub (*cough* Joey *cough*). Most importantly, you have to do at least 13 beaches and 2 jumps in one day. Mind the tides. Be grateful we have so many choices.
The Beaches- partial list
alphabetical order
Annisquam lighthouse. Coffin’s beach. Good Harbor beach. Long beach. Magnolia beach. Niles beach. Pavilion beach (by Beach Court). Pavilion beach bonus (by the cut). Plum Cove beach. Rocky Neck Oakes Cove beach. Stage Fort Park (1) – Cressy’s beach ( our alt. title ‘sea serpent’ big beach). Stage Fort Park (2) – Half Moon beach. Wheeler’s Point. Wingaersheek beach.
The Jumps- partial list
Annisquam bridge. Magnolia Pier.
*We do this challenge at least once each summer. Yesterday we started off with breakfast at Willow’s Rest and continued from there. Our timing was random especially as we spent hours at Wingaersheek. The second meal to get us through the day came from the sandwich counter at Annie’s by Wingaersheek. Yes, they have a sandwich counter.
Gloucester Beaches sandwich directory
Good Morning Gloucester 
I am always up for the beach after work
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we looked for you in Magnolia–didn’t get there till late in the day
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My favorite place to jump when I was growing up was at the Stone Pier on Rt.128 and the Bridge on Sumner St. No beach but at high tide they were always fun to go to.. This is a great idea Catherine. I need to find Donna at her beach soon!!
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Thanks, Pauline!
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you forgot “dun fuggin” beach. I bet no one knows where that is. Yes it’s real and in the 70’s they had a city lifeguard there.
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Where was that beach Rick?
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Thanks for adding, Rick. I didn’t forget it or some others. I didn’t know there was a life guard. Gloucester is crazy decadent beach rich!
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dun fuggin is behind GHS near the boat ramp. It’s the site where barges hauled goods across the “cut”. It was called “fugging”. when they got across they were “done fugging”. There’s still a small beach there but I don’t think it’s maintained anymore.
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Thank you Rick. I knew that was DunFudgin but never remembered the beach. I would swim on the small beach right at the train bridge at the cement plant that my family owned though. Thanks for the info,
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Thanks —I heard of this beach but never met it sounds like one of the places we used to call hidden park few knew of out west and that’s the fun of it! 🙂 Dave & Kim 🙂
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Is this challenge similar to hitting a bar at each train stop?
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