I agree with those that said Bethany.

Laid back beach town with that small town feel. Family friendly and no crazy stuff going on like Rehoboth or OC. It’s great.

But secret is out and prices are high within town limits. Just went to open house on new build, 2700 sq feet, not even by beach, on busy Garfield Parkway for 1.7 million.

Lewes, DE is a slower pace and more year round than the beach resorts.

Deep Creek Lake has beaches

Grocery stores are terrible in Bethany? Have you ever been here? This might have been true 50 plus years ago but not true today. We have a Giant that is a match for the ones at home plus others that are modern and nice. Along with specialty shops like DeFibos market for terrific Italian food, excellent handy restaurants, etc.
Things are busy in season but spring and fall are the best seasons here for pleasant weather, lack of crowds, and relaxed pace of life.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Bethany?

No traffic is horrible in season

Old white 78 year olds with guns running HOAs. Police are worthless

Nothing to do in winter at all
Have to go to Rehoboth or Salisbury for anything
Grocery stores are awful

Do you work for the Bethany Beach Chamber of Commerce ?

Captain's Cove is on the MD/VA border
https://captscove.com/

Our house is in Ocean Pines MD which I preferred over the Delaware locations because of beach traffic. You can ignore the weekend traffic if you want to by taking back roads to places. In DE, there are no back roads to get around traffic. https://www.oceanpines.org/

Anonymous wrote:Bethany Beach. Fenwick.
Am writing in from Bethany this minute.
Very nice. Definitely far different experience from Ocean City.

HAHAHA!! Nice, we're also in Bethany right now and I came here to say Bethany.

Atlantic beach
Holden beach

Anonymous wrote:Bethany?

No traffic is horrible in season

Old white 78 year olds with guns running HOAs. Police are worthless

Nothing to do in winter at all
Have to go to Rehoboth or Salisbury for anything
Grocery stores are awful

Also might want to look on the bay side - like Long Neck DE.

If you are willing to drive 3,5 hours each way, fly somewhere decent and use a vacation rental. Add up the money.
Best advice I ever got was not to buy a second home with a $1000/mo HOA fee. At the time in the early 90s, $12K paid for flights and a 2 week stay.

OP here- Thanks! Bethany wasn’t really on our radar, but it looks beautiful! We will look into it.

Bethany Beach. Fenwick.
Am writing in from Bethany this minute.
Very nice. Definitely far different experience from Ocean City.

Bethany?

We are looking to purchase a vacation home in the next couple years, ideally something near a beach that is peaceful, quiet, and not too crowded. Would like it to be no more than 3-3.5 hrs from Baltimore with moderate traffic. Does such a place even exist? We've looked at Ocean City, it's too congested and not particularly relaxing. Would love to hear if anyone has a vacation spot around here that they love.