It Will Be a Sad Day If Georgica Beach Closes for the Summer
Plenty of people are still calling it Hurricane Irene, but it technically was Tropical Storm Irene, and it did virtually no damage to the Hamptons, except for one beach that everybody in East Hampton loves.
Georgica Beach—with it’s glorious jetties that protrude out into the ocean to the delight of surfers, its awesome lifeguard shack and its exclusivity to East Hampton Village parking only—may not be open to swimmers this year.
East Hampton officials still aren’t sure whether or not the beach will have a lifeguard because erosion was so significant this year. There is talk that instead, a lifeguard tower will be moved to Wiborgs.
It will be a sad day if this happens. I’ve been down to Georgica recently, and the beach has come back quite a bit. I’ve seen scary erosion in my life here in the Hamptons, and my experience has been that the beaches here always come and go. Georgica has certainly not seen its last days.
But as a former lifeguard at Georgica Beach I can tell you that if it closes down, the saddest people of all will be the lifeguards. Ocean lifeguarding at Georgica is quite possibly the best job in the world, because the surfing by the jetties is a quick hike down the beach.
If the Village does close down the beach, it won’t mean that you can’t park there, it just means that you won’t be protected by lifeguards during the day, so don’t get too down. According to Larry Cantwell of East Hampton, the chances of Georgica Beach being completely closed, meaning access to the beach will be denied, is pretty much zero percent.