Assateague Island National Seashore, Maryland, United States

5Lou L 5:00 PM Jan 7, 2020

Great Getaway Any Time of Year
After Christmas, my wife and I decided to get away for a night and settled on Assateague Island National Seashore. We love visiting the National Park sites and I was intrigued by the possibility of seeing the wild horses. We were originally planning on doing this trip over the summer, but you could imagine (or maybe you can't) how much less expensive this was to do during the winter. We stayed at the Holiday Inn Ocean City which was roughly 15 minutes from the entrance to the National Seashore. We arrived around 11 in the afternoon to a windy and crowded parking lot, however it was roughly 65 degrees in late December. We started at the visitor center to stamp our passports and browse the gift shop (above standards for NPS sites). The visitor center has several displays on the ecosystem, the horses, and conservation. The touch tank was also a lot of fun. Much to our dismay, the Rangers on duty said due to the season there was a good possibility we wouldn't see any horses due to hiding in the brush on the side of the road. As we drove for 5 minutes after entering the park officially (the pay station is a little further in past the visitor center over the bridge) we hadn't seen anything. Then we saw a crowd of people so we knew we'd be seeing something and one horse was grazing on the side of the road. A couple told us that there were often horse sightings at the end of the park's designation near the parking lot. We continued on and much to my joy and my wife's shock, we found roughly 6-8 horses in that area. Please be cautioned though, the behavior we witnessed there was far below what the Rangers and normal people expect. These are wild animals that can kick and bite, yet parents were encouraging their young children to get close to the animals for photos. The horses aren't meant to be fed by humans as it increases their dependence on outside food sources away from their habitat. Also be cautious of the speed limits in the park, as horses and bikers/runners are out and about in abundance. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit to the beach and other areas. Obviously the winter is not the season for this but it provided a calm sensation that we were both looking forward to.

4TLSeymour 5:00 PM Aug 16, 2022

Definitely a place to visit BUT arrive EARLY
Beautiful, plenty of space, walking trails, wood pathways, and signage is good. Beach is great. The only reason for 4 stars instead of 5, is that we were camping right next door at Assateague State Park, and purchased a $25 one week pass to get in to the National Seashore. The problem is that if we did not drive into the Seashore before 9am, then the line to get in to the Seashore was obnoxious, well over one mile waiting in traffic. There was no "fast pass" lane for those who already purchased an entrance ticket.