Is Your Hometown A 'Ghostown' This Weekend?

[Saphire]

I love, love, love holiday weekends. The roads are clear, the stores are dead, the neighborhood is quiet. I don't know where everyone went, but I love staying home when everyone else is away. We like quieter vacations too, often traveling in the shoulder season or off season to avoid the masses. I actually went food shopping today (usually go on Monday's) and there were only a few people there. Very surprising for a Sunday. What about you? Is your town quiet too, and do you like it?

 

[princesspiglet]

No. I live right outside of Hershey, PA. Therefore, from May until September our little town is jam packed full of people. We were driving to Panera yesterday for breakfast and the traffic was insane! However, I love it and look forward to it every year!

 

[#1hockeymom]

It [our town] usually is empty of regulars and filled with city folk who think we're the country. This weekend it is filled with regulars. The campers stayed home. The residents stayed home too. Gas is 3.50 on average. While I know most people around here can afford to go to their up north cabins, I believe we're all in the same boat and trying to show we're pissed off at the price of gas.

 

[AKL_Megs]

I'm pretty happy as well!

It's really quiet in my "neighborhood" (apartment). We haven't heard a sound from our neighbors upstairs (and I can tell you we HAVE NOT missed them and their cement shoes...), and our young and popular neighbor across the courtyard also seems to have gone away for the weekend to party elsewhere (we haven't missed all of his drunk girlfriends and burping buddies this weekend, that's for sure...)

It's been a peaceful weekend.

 

[minniecarousel]

We have the annual "Art and Wind Festival" the next town over every Memorial Weekend, so it's always fun to go to that. We don't go any where near the freeway interchange if we can help it. I had to drive East on Friday afternoon to pick up my niece and nephews - that's the route to Yosemite and Lake Tahoe. ugh - very heavy traffic. My sister gets the honor of taking them home on Monday. I warned her that her drive home (West) will be in heavy traffic, if she doesn't take them home early!

 

[cccm]

We now have tourists back. So the season is in full swing. No matter where I go it will be busy.

Saphire - I am in Plymouth, MA.

 

[ChristmasElf]

Ghost town??? I wish....

 

[gris gris]

I love, love, love holiday weekends. The roads are clear, the stores are dead, the neighborhood is quiet. I don't know where everyone went,

They all came to my town LOL!! We live in a town that has 10,000 residents year round and it swells to 30,000 in the summer. Can't stand it at all. We start complaining right about now. We're lucky to live where we live, but I sing Jimmy Buffett's "When the Coast is Clear" all summer, because it describes our town perfectly. All summer long we grocery shop as late at night as we possibly can and traffic is crazy. It's not all bad though - we benefit quite a bit from the people who own huge ocean & river front homes that don't live her all year, they pay their taxes too. We have an incredibly low mill rate

 

[BriarfoxinWA]

I wish it were quiet here this weekend. There's a big concert at the Gorge which means our county of 60,000 will add an additional 60,000 of crazy concert goers. Between that and people from Seattle coming over to go to the local lakes it's insane. I'm trying to stay home and not even go to the grocery store this weekend.

 

[jonestavern]

Even with our tourist 'influx' we are still a pretty pokey little town

There are a lot of lakes in this stretch of woods, so many camps.
Mostly what you wicked have to watch out for are the folks towing big trailered boats, driving massive RVs--the folks who really aren't accustomed to piloting these things, let alone up narrow, 2 laned winding, hilly country roads.
Oh, yeah, most of the roads are unpaved
So we just ride these roads hugging the right side white line & hope the oncoming hasn't had a few cocktails before hopping into that Winnebago hauling the family boat!
There is only one real general store in 'town' (police station, town hall, church & said general store) so from now until Labor Day we have to get our ice early!

jean

 

[lucas]

It is quiet around here on this holiday weekend. Plus, the snowbirds are gone!

 

["Got Disney"]

I live in SanDiego......not a chance

 

[tar heel]

I live near Lowe's Motor Speedway, so it's about as far from a ghost town as you can get.

 

[ducklite]

It's been absolute tourist hell. People driving 30 mph in a 55 mph zone, stopping in the middle of an intersection for no reason, you name it. Why oh why won't they take the 429 instead of 27 to get to WDW? Especially in thier rolling Hiltons that take 3/4 of a mile to get up to speed after a red light while they're in the left lane blocking traffic.

Anne

 

[Tybug]

Oh no... far from quiet here! The only chance of quiet for the next 4 months is a hurricane evac! Mind you, I don't want one... but that's the only chance of quiet!

 

[Disneyaunt4]

Not quiet here. Memorial Day marks the beginning of tourist season Can't complain I feel very lucky to be able to live in the town I grew up in

 

[MUFFYCAT]

Not quiet here. We have the "ghetto fair/carnival" this weekend with 2 nights of fireworks and the parade today.

 

[aprilgail2]

Not quiet here, everyone is having their memorial day parties in their yards and the thunderbirds are roaring overhead, some so low we can see how many wheels are on their landing gear! One was so low my neighbor joked that the pilot had blue eyes LOL!!!!

 

[ducklite]

Not quiet here. We have the "ghetto fair/carnival" this weekend with 2 nights of fireworks and the parade today.

Ugh. You have my sympathy. For about three years I lived in a town (population about 2500) and we had one every July. It would attract over 10,000 people a day. You can imagine the traffic mess, especially because there was really only a couple of way in and out of town, and only one main street. The park it was held in was in a really residential area with zero parking lots within ten blocks. People would come home to find cars in their driveways, on their lawns, it was terrible. I lived in an apartment and only had on-street parking, and would not move my car for the entire weekend or I never would have found a place to park when I returned.

Anne

 

[Kteacher]

It will be quiet today, but the past 3 days have been commencement days for Amherst College and UMASS. Most residents stay home to avoid the traffic until after the students have left town!