After four long years of rushing to finish deadlines, giving up social lives to prepare for the SATs and spending hours on strenuous homework, seniors are finally near the finish line. It is a tradition for seniors to celebrate their graduation from high school with a week-long trip to the beach with their friends. With our school being so big, different groups go about beach week in different ways.
What most people would consider the typical beach week is renting a house or condo on or near the beach. Some of the most common beach week destinations are Ocean City, Bethany Beach, Rehoboth Beach and Dewey Beach. All of these locations have different housing options, whether a small group wants to rent a condo, or a big group wants to rent a house near the water.
While this is what you would call the typical beach week plans, there are also downsides. These popular locations are always crowded with groups coming from schools all over. Having this large number of people in one area creates dangerous situations and increases the likelihood of a beach week disaster, which is extremely common. There is no doubt that within some of the groups attending beach week, there will be some illegal activities, and being in such close quarters only exacerbates this probable issue. Because of these possible consequences, lots of groups decide to do their own thing for beach week.
Senior Chase Higgins has planned a fun lake week instead of beach week with his friends. “Me and about 10 of my close friends decided to rent a house at Deep Creek Lake instead of one on the beach. We had trouble finding a house on the beach that worked for all of us, and we knew that having a house secluded on the lake would be safer, so we all agreed to have a senior lake week,” Higgins said.
Beach week can be a fun week away with your friends, but there are numerous possibilities for accidents. Because of this unfortunate truth, there are parents who do not allow their child to participate in beach week festivities. Not only parents see the downsides to beach week. There are lots of students who choose not to go to beach week simply because they are not interested. Senior Kyra Goldstein has her own fun week planned to start off her summer. “My aunt has a nice place in California, so for the first week in June I will be visiting her there instead of going to beach week,” Goldstein said.
Family vacations are a much safer alternative to the typical senior beach week, and they can also be more exciting. Senior Eric Quam has interesting travel plans with his family this summer. “My family and I are going to Spain and Portugal in the beginning of June. We go international every other year for a special vacation and I would rather take this opportunity to travel far rather than rent a house with my friends a few hours from my house,” Quam said.
