Minus Pavilion, Ocean Boulevard Marches On

Spring 2007 in Myrtle Beach brings with it uncharted waters, mainly the uncertainty surrounding the city’s first tourist season without the Myrtle Beach Pavilion Amusement Park.

While some continue to wrestle with the question (“What will we do now?”), I figured that this Good Friday evening – the apex of a usually busy Easter/Spring Break week on the Grand Strand – would be as good a time as any to venture out, check out the sights and get some initial answers. And what better place to start than with the city’s lone remaining amusement park (for now, anyway), Family Kingdom?

As it has for years, the Swamp Fox Roller Coaster dominated the landscape as multi-colored lights from Family Kingdom’s 30-plus rides lit up the April sky (and a parking lot that by 8 p.m. appeared at full capacity). South Carolina’s largest Ferris Wheel gave revelers their own unique vantage point of an active strip. And screams echoed from the SlingShot Drop Zone, where a 110-foot climb gave riders a (literally) bird’s eye view of the surrounding coastline, and the ensuing free-fall vertical drop left more than a lump in their throats (their stomachs, maybe?).

Traveling north up Ocean Boulevard from 3rd Avenue South, sidewalks were teeming with people making their way in and out of the Gay Dolphin, Ripley’s Believe It or Not! and Haunted House attractions, among others. The four-lane thoroughfare bore bumper-to-bumper (but moving) traffic in both directions. All the while, the vacant Pavilion site sat largely ignored – no bystanders reminiscing, no rubbernecking drivers holding up traffic. Either folks had other things to do, or just figured that the walk down Memory Lane could wait for another evening that wasn’t so chilly.

The surrounding areas boasted a fair amount of construction work on either side of the boulevard. But neither were there any road cones or barricades in sight to obstruct traffic, nor was there any evidence of orange & white obstacles lying in wait for less active times. Myrtle Beach Police patrolled the area the more athletic way, pedaling bicycles back and forth to keep the proceedings flowing and the streets peaceful and safe.

Some 15 blocks north of Family Kingdom’s free-falling ride, thrill seekers flocked to another sling shot attraction, this one producing the opposite effect (instead of falling 11 stories, they waited in line to let a steel cage tethered to two oversized rubber bands fling them 18 stories into the deep dark night).

The drive across town on 21st Avenue North revealed the bright lights of Coastal Federal Field, where despite the chill in the air and the novelty of the Myrtle Beach Pelicans’ opening night 24 hours removed, thousands still braved the elements to cheer on their hometown heroes. Further down the street at the Highway 17 Bypass, the parking lot at NASCAR Café bore a striking resemblance to the infield at the Daytona 500, and the next-door NASCAR SpeedPark looked equally crowded.

The bustle of a busy Easter Weekend in Myrtle Beach would seem to bode well for the Grand Strand’s short-term prospects. And those are aplenty, beginning with next month’s spring bike rallies and quickly escalating with the crunch time of the summer season.

It also reminds us of a clichéd but inescapable truth:

Life goes on.

As some wring their hands over the passing of a bygone era and a future of an Ocean Boulevard sans Pavilion, and others delight in the anticipation of future attractions (see: Hard Rock Park), most everyone else seems quite content going about their business of the moment. In this case, it’s the pursuit of Grand Strand pleasure. And on a blustery Good Friday night in Myrtle Beach, there was plenty of it to go around.

Summer can’t start soon enough.