Wishing for WiFi?
Coming back from a weekend on the beach -- this is the 29th summer I've spent time on the Jersey Shore -- I got to thinking about how much has changed since I was a kid. When we got down to the beach in the morning and realized we'd forgotten a book, or a towel or the red shovel, we'd trek back up to the house and get it. Now you just whip out your cellphone and call up to see who's still there and can bring it down for you on their way to the beach.
And wireless? Summer at the beach meant communicating via old-fashioned letters. Now rental houses have Internet connections as one of the perks they list, along with washer-dryers and outdoor showers. And according to this story, Ocean City, N.J. -- the entire town, I mean -- should be up and wireless by next summer. So the next time you get down to the beach and realize you forgot your Washington Post on the kitchen table, hey, you can just whip out your laptop and log on to www.washingtonpost.com with the sand between your toes.
As this story explains, the city-wide WiFi access will be covered, in part, by a $6 access fee paid by tourists. And while the plan is being installed in order for residents to have wifi access, the beach badges would become high tech as well. (Yup, Ocean City's one of those Jersey towns where you have to pay to access the beach). One thought is that a family could link their electronic badges, so that if Junior wanders off the beach with someone other than Mom or Dad, Mom and Dad would get an alert. And badge checkers wouldn't have to comb the beach and wake up snoozing beach-goers in search of badge-ditchers. That alone would make a city-wide wifi system worth it.
Airports, hotels, coffeehouses and now beaches -- where next? And while in general I'm very happy to find internet access, sometimes it does mean the death knell of a true vacation. Where's the most incongruous place you've logged on while on supposedly getting away from it all?
By Anne McDonough |
July 24, 2007; 10:04 AM ET
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Posted by: Rieux | July 24, 2007 10:33 AM
I think it's sad that people have become so attached to the internet. Yes, it's great you can keep in touch from anywhere, but it keeps you from truly getting away.
Posted by: Dennis | July 25, 2007 9:58 AM
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Day(14.06.07): I ask foto & e-mail my daughter(m.b. between other people). Last
2 years I am ~Minsk of Belarus. I looking somwone, who help me made & get job & any
Travel document (m.b. across other country). Please, help...
Posted by: Zoya Seliverstova | July 25, 2007 11:36 AM
I try to choose vacation spots for their inaccessibility to the outside world, but it's getting much harder to do. I went to China this spring on vacation and my blackberry worked Everywhere. I was emailing not only from Lhasa, Tibet, but from the "Train to the Roof of the World" that goes through the mountains of Tibet and the real rural backcountry of China. Ridiculous. (Our hotel in Lhasa had an internet connection, but it was unnecessary because of the blackberry.)
Posted by: Adub | August 1, 2007 2:26 PM
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In 2003 I was traveling in the Amazon, staying at a floating lodge 4 hours by boat from Manaus. Before we flew back, we spent one night in Manaus (a city in the middle of the rainforest) and I took the opportunity to check my email and instant message with a friend. She was living in Skopje, Macedonia that summer, a place with limited infrastructure. As we were chatting we both saw news of the huge blackout in the Northeast US. I'm from CT and she's from NJ so we both got a kick out of the fact that we were on opposite sides of the world, in remote places chatting on the internet and our parents in NJ and CT were in the dark!