Stopping for lunch along Route 322 on a winter trip to Wildwood in 1983.  In the back is the family Buick Century station wagon complete with simulated wood-grained side panels....what a car.  I'm the one standing in this picture.

My family is from the Philadelphia area, so getting to Wildwood was not a big trip.  We would pack up the family station wagon with beach chairs, towels, bags, food and a beach umbrella and would make the anticipated venture south.  Before the construction of Route 55, my dad would always take the back roads of Jersey to get to Wildwood.  His confusing route would take over three hours, but he managed to avoid the tolls of the Atlantic City Expressway and the Garden State Parkway.

We always entered the Wildwoods from the North Wildwood entrance.  This entrance was made up of a two lane highway that went past a shanty town of houses that were collapsing into the bay. We also had to pass over two bridges on this route, one was a draw-bridge and the other was an old rickety wooden bridge that reminded me of the boardwalk.  The sound of driving over this bridge was unforgettable.

	Click to see some of our 1987 home video of entering North Wildwood through "shanty town."  We always sang the song, "Will Santa Come to Shanty Town" while driving past these shanty homes.  We also cross over the draw-bridge in the video.
	Click to see our 1987 home movie of crossing the rickety wooden bridge into North Wildwood.

In the late 90s, a new four lane highway into North Wildwood was constructed and gone were the shanty town, the draw bridge, and the old wooden bridge.