OCEAN CITY, Md. -- For coastal towns on Delmarva, Memorial Day Weekend ushers in a new season. It signals the 'unofficial' start of summer, when the beaches and businesses of Ocean City are at their busiest.
This year however, was not necessarily one for the record books. As the clock counted down to the start of the holiday weekend, an uneasy feeling among hotels began to grow.
"From our perspective, during the week there was a slow booking pace, everybody was kind of feeling a lot of anxiety leading up to it," said Keith Whisenant, General Manager of the Residence Inn.
The same can be said for restaurants. Douglas Buxbaum, owner of Buxy's Salty Dog Saloon, said when Friday finally rolled around, he was confused by the crowds he saw.
"There's times that we're all scratching our heads," said Buxbaum. "Every year, Friday, you get all amped up and there's not a lot of people in town or they're just getting here."
But as Friday turned into Saturday, more people were filing into hotels. Whisenant said they sold out all 150 rooms through the weekend.
"Something happened Friday night into Saturday and Sunday where the flood gates opened," said Whisenant. "We were very fortunate guests showed up."
As the hotel rooms filled up, so did restaurants, but it still wasn't the 'perfect' weekend.
"There was a lot of foot traffic, dinner was great, continuous," said Buxbaum. "It wasn't just, it wasn't the mad dash all at once."
While businesses we spoke with said this past weekend was decent to good at best, their outlook for the rest of the summer is still fairly confident.
"We always say this[Memorial Day Weekend] is the kickoff but in reality, you know you have St. Patrick's Day Parade, you have Cruisin', so we had a great shoulder season and traditionally summers before an election year are fantastic," said Buxbaum.