Bethany Beach Nature Center, located on the north side of Route 26 next to Grotto Pizza.

Loop Canal Centennial Park, located at Pennsylvania Avenue and First Street - read our town's historical marker.

Delaware Seashore State Park, located north of Bethany Beach on Delaware Route 1, is open from 8 a.m. to sunset, year-round. This park offers six miles of ocean and bay shoreline, a campground, 295-slip marina with charter and headboat as well as a boat ramp.  

By Michael Morgan Special to the Wave

In 1809, the English botanist Thomas Nutall came to southern Delaware to see one of America's most impressive natural phenomena. At that time, cartographers often ignored the inlets and islands that lined the coast, but mapmakers seldom failed to draw the Great Cypress Swamp as an irregular dark mass several miles wide that straddled the border between Delaware and Maryland.

The Englishman stopped at the Dagsboro home of one of Sussex County's older residents, who agreed to guide the young botanist into the Great Cypress Swamp. Nutall later recalled: "About a mile from the house we began to enter one of the most frightful labyrinths you can imagine. It was filled with tall tangling shrubs thickly matted together almost impervious to the light." When Nutall explored the "frightful labyrinth" of southern Sussex County, the swamp contained about 50,000 acres; but a half-century earlier, the swamp had been even larger.

During the 17th century, most colonists who preferred to settle near the coastal bays avoided the swamp. In the middle of the 18th century, John Dagworthy was given title to a large portion of the swamp; and he began to drain its edges to create dry cropland. He also discovered that the cypress logs could be split into shingles, which were extremely resistant to rot. When the botanist Nutall arrived in the early 19th century, farmers were cultivating the land that had once been part of the swamp; and shingle makers had established camps, where the mined the soggy land for old cypress logs.

Over the centuries, many of the swamp's trees had been toppled by windstorms, and the cypress trunks often sank into the spongy mass of soft peat that covered the floor of the boggy forest. The mossy mass that covered the fallen trees had a curing effect on the timber. When the buried logs were raised, it was discovered that they could be split into shingles that were nearly impervious to rot.

After Dagworthy established his estate in southern Sussex County, workers began to explore the swamp in search of buried cypress logs. The shingle workers established a network of trails that enabled them to enter the swamp without difficulty.

Although many areas of the forest bed looked firm, there were many deep spots that could swallow a person in seconds. The shingle workers used hollow logs that contained little usable timber to create pathways. Although these wooden walkways provided a firm footing, they created another hazard. Before stepping on a log, experienced shingle workers would tap the timber with their boots to scare off the water moccasins and other snakes that had taken up residence in the wood.

On the firm land formed by high spots in the swamp, camps were established to cut the cypress log shingles. Workers located the buried cypress trunks by poking a long iron rod along the swamp floor. By carefully probing the soft mossy ground, workers could determine the location and the shape of logs that lay just under the surface. After a suitable trunk was located, a gang of a half-dozen men used wooden poles to pry the log from the swamp floor. When enough of the trunk was exposed, the workers cut a log of a convenient length so that it could be easily dragged to the camp. After the log was sliced into foot-long sections, a worker used a long blade and a wooden mallet to split the sections into rough shingles. Another worker would taper one end of the shingle so that it would fit properly on a roof. Finished shingles were stacked into bundles to be carried out of the swamp.

Shingles from the Great Cypress Swamp were so long-lasting that some that were cut two centuries ago are believed to be on homes today.

Normally, the Great Cypress Swamp was soggy with moisture, but during prolonged droughts, the upper level of the swamp floor would become unusually dry. After a long dry spell in the later 18th century, a fire began in the dry peat, and it burned for several weeks. Wind- blown embers from the fire drifted across Sussex County to the Delaware beaches. Throughout the 19th century, the swamp continued to be drained, filled and cultivated. The shingle workers also continued to mine the area for cypress logs.

By the 20th century, the size of the swamp had been greatly reduced, but remained one of the darkest corners of Sussex County. A prolonged drought during the 1930s turned the swamp into a tinderbox, and it caught fire again. The fire burned through the dry peat of the swamp floor for eight months. The blaze consumed so many of the old cypress logs that the last of the remaining shingle operations closed. In the 1970s, two nonprofit groups, Delaware Wetlands and the Conservation Fund, have worked to protect what remains of the Great Cypress Swamp. Delaware Wetlands owns more than 11,000 acres of the swamp. There has also been a movement to make the swamp that was once one of America's greatest natural wonders Delaware's first national park. For now, motorists who drive between Selbyville and Gumboro can get a small taste of what Thomas Nutall experienced when he entered "the most frightful labyrinth" of southern Delaware.

Holts Landing State Park, located on the south shore of the Indian River Bay, has a pavilion for picnics, boat ramp, horseshoe pits, playground and ball fields and offers clamming, crabbing and fishing opportunities. The park is Delaware's smallest at a bit over 200 acres. Take Route 26 west from Bethany Beach and turn right on County Road 346 to the park entrance.  The park is open from 8 a.m. to sunset year-round.
Park Office    (302) 539-9060

James Farm Ecological Preserve, located on Cedar Neck Road about five miles northwest of Bethany Beach, provides guided tours, demonstrations and various exhibits.  You can walk through the woods and learn about native Delaware birds, trees, wildflowers and shrubs.  Center for the Inland Bays operates the James Farm.  The Center's missions include research, education, restoration and public policy.  Delaware's inland bays consist of three interconnected bodies of water in southeastern Sussex County:  Indian River Bay, Little Assawoman Bay and Rehoboth Bay.  These bays and their tributaries cover over 32 square miles and are shallow, with an average depth ranging from 3 to 8 feet.  The James Farm provides three observation towers and a number of clearly marked trails on it 150 acres along Indian River Bay.  Free. 
Center Office (302) 645-7325
Click Center for Inland Bays to visit their website.