Fenwick Island

Late spring and early summer thunderstorms have brought a bevy of rain to the area, causing lawns to explode with growth and grass to grow well higher than a grasshopper’s eye. For some area property owners, that has meant extra time spent mowing their lawns. For others, it has meant letters from town hall, official citations, fines and even expensive mowing fees.

The sixth annual Fenwick Island Bonfire will light up the night on Saturday, July 5, at 6:30 p.m. and go until 10:30 p.m. The rain date for the event is July 6.

The winds of change may soon be sweeping through Delaware with renewed force.

On Monday, June 23, the powers behind the offshore wind farm - Delmarva Power and Babcock & Brown - announced they had reached an agreement.

The Fenwick Island Environmental Committee heard from representatives from Artesian Water Company at their monthly meeting on June 9, learning about how water gets “from the aquifer to your home.”

For less than what you would pay at the grocery store or a commercial produce stand, people can buy fresh vegetables at East View Farm on Bayard Road almost year-round.

Like many people armed with the right attitude and plenty of determination, Brandon and Kerry Case, owners of Antique Prints in Ocean View, turned something unexpected into an opportunity.

Fenwick Island is $48,000 richer, thanks to the recent sale of their town-owned trash trucks. Town manager Tony Carson reported at the Town Council’s May 23 meeting that, with the help of Police Chief William Boyden and his knowledge of eBay, the two trucks have been sold and the buyers were to fly in to retrieve them.

HipAHA, Fenwick Island Boot Camp, is gearing up for its second season, with a June retreat fast approaching.

Although new to the Delaware/Maryland coastal art scene, Dee Granger is no stranger to beach life, and no stranger to art.

For the past four years, Brian DeLuca has captured the essence of Philadelphia’s eats and has been supplying the shore with thousands of cheesesteaks and subs with Philly’s Finest. This past weekend, he introduced his latest establishment, High Stakes Bar and Grill, right next door to his shop just outside Fenwick Island on Route 54.

I stopped in at the new Harris Teeter grocery store on Route 54 a few weeks ago, for the first time, and picked up a few things on the way home. I was pleased with what I saw and returned to do my regular grocery shopping the following week.

The Fenwick Island Environmental Committee met on Wednesday, May 14 to discuss water, water and more water.

Life began to return to normal in coastal Delaware on Wednesday, as flood waters from this week’s late-season nor’easter finally began to recede and damage assessment turned into recovery. The sounds of chain saws, pumps and rakes were common throughout the area mid-week, as property owners sought to clean up what Mother Nature had flooded, shredded and broken Monday into Tuesday morning.

Despite this week’s nor’easter — or perhaps all the better for it — the annual Fenwick Island Beach Clean-up will be held this Saturday, May 17, at 9 a.m., starting at Dagsboro Street.

Photos from the May 12-13 storm are shown in slideshow format below, with newer photos toward the end. All photos are copyright © Coastal Point, LLC, and may not be used without express permission of the Coastal Point.

The Delaware State Police and Department of Transportation reopened Route 1 between Dewey Beach and Fred Hudson Road/Road 360 north of Bethany Beach and the Indian River Inlet Bridge late Tuesday afternoon, following a detailed inspection of the inlet and surrounding roadways. Remaining closed Tuesday, due to high water, were: Fred Hudson Road in the area of Route 1 and Old Mill Road in Millville, as well as several other roads in the Lewes, Slaughter Beach and Oak Orchard areas.

ResortQuest Delaware has announced its acquisition of Seacoast Realty, making it the state’s largest beach real estate brokerage. The two companies have had a substantial impact in the area’s real estate market in the past, stretching from North Bethany to Fenwick Island, and westward, and now, into Ocean City, Md.

Deserie Lawrence hit the ground running, starting her new job as sales, marketing and events manager at the Bethany Fenwick Chamber of Commerce just the week before the annual Ocean to Bay Bike Tour.

This year’s Spring Fishing Tournament is set Saturday, May 10, from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., and it will be hosted for the first time by Old Inlet Bait and Tackle.

Property owners in Fenwick Island can now pick up parking tags at Town Hall. The town had previously announced that no parking permits would be mailed this year and reminded citizens of that change at their April 25 regular town council meeting.

Farmers’ markets are sprouting up throughout coastal Delaware, and an already-impressive crop of new markets from 2007 will be joined this year by a Friday-morning market at the Bethany-Fenwick Area Chamber of Commerce’s headquarters right outside Fenwick Island, starting June 27.

The Bethany Beach Town Council voted 6-1 on Friday, April 18, to adopt the smoking ban the town has spent the last seven months debating and turning into legislation. With the vote, the town became the first in the state of Delaware to ban smoking on a public beach.

The Bethany Beach Town Council voted 6-1 on Friday, April 18, to adopt the smoking ban the town has spent the last seven months debating and turning into legislation. With the vote, the town became the first in the state of Delaware to ban smoking on a public beach. Such bans already exist in many California beach towns, as well as on the Great Lakes and in New England.

The Fenwick Island Environmental Committee met on Wednesday, April 9, to discuss curbside recycling in detail and had a speaker from DSWA guide them through the process.

On Friday, March 28, the Fenwick Island Town Council voted to approve the concept of ambulance service from the Bethany Beach Volunteer Fire Company for their district starting in January of 2009, at which time the Millville Volunteer Fire Company plans to cease covering the Bethany district with its ambulance service.

The Fenwick Island Environmental Committee recently got itself organized — complete with proposed goals and objectives and a mission statement, but they got their start years ago according to Buzz Henifin, co-chairman of the group.

“Town council always had one member as an ‘environmental’ person,” explained Henifin.

For people who can’t make Fenwick Island’s monthly town council meeting this Friday, March 28, at 3:30 p.m., life just got a whole lot easier.

Your new friends need help.

The Fenwick Island Environmental Committee met on Wednesday, March 12, at town hall to discuss a number of environmental issues, including their “tree triage” program, ways to save on energy, how to get to the town’s population of renters to participate in the new townwide curbside recycling program, and whether the town should look at increasing limits on smoking on the beach and town prope

March 29 is dedicated to trees in Fenwick Island. At 10 a.m., the Environmental Committee will host a talk on the importance of trees featuring Dorothy Abbott of the Extension for Renewable Resources at the University of Delaware Extension Service.