9/04

I was curious, and read some of your reviews of beaches in Delaware and Maryland, and decided to check out some of the beaches. I have a summer home in Fenwick Island, DE, and frequent the Fenwick Island State Park beach, which is ideal for top freedom. On Memorial Day (2004) weekend I visited and sunbathed topfree with only my thong bikini both days I visited the beach. The beach is so long, with very few sunbathers that no one seemed to notice or much care. I noticed one other female top free and one man in a thong swimsuit. I plan on making it my primary sunbathing spot this summer as it is not congested, and there aren't any gawkers.

--Nicole, Rockville, Maryland

10/02

James and I had some business to do in Ocean City on Thursday, and being tired of the stuffy crowd at Ocean City, decided to check out the beach immediately to the north of OC, called Fenwick State Beach in Delaware. We parked at 146th Street in Ocean City actually, and walked out onto the beach and crossed into Delaware. The first thing we saw was a woman wearing a thong. She was with her husband and her two children and all of them were playing in the surf. We've never seen anyone wearing a thong at Ocean City, so it looked promising. It was amazing how different the vibe was, just north of the state line. So James and I walked about 500 yards north to the first lifeguard tower and asked the two young female lifeguards if their beach allowed women to sunbathe topfree. Her initial answer was "Yeah, I'm pretty sure..." then she decided to ask her supervisor. The answer that eventually came back: Yes. She said that if anyone complained badly, she would only come talk to me but that it was definitely okay and we wouldn't get in trouble. So just like we did in Fort Lauderdale, we put our towel right next to the lifeguard stand, to show everybody that we were legitimate, and I went topfree. We stayed through a lifeguard shift change, actually, which was amusing since the new lifeguard was a guy and quite pleased with his working conditions. But we were cool so he was cool. No one else went topfree with me, and one pair of soccer moms I thought was going to complain, but no one did and we were around for about two hours. We saw two more women wearing thongs, both walking along the beach. It was awesome, especially for Delaware. Delaware has always been stodgy about beach wear and we haven't laid out on a Delaware Beach probably for 10 years or more for that very reason. It felt really nice to see things changing. I think the key here is not to push it (who ever does?) The lifeguard clearly has the right attitude, but knowing Delaware, it won't take much to change that attitude. But boy do we have a new beach in the meantime. We're really psyched.

--Katherine and James, Princess Anne, Maryland