SPRING LAKE is one of the smallest, most uncommercial communities on the shore, a gentle respite on the road south to Atlantic City. Tourism in this elegant Victorian resort evolved slowly, without the booms, crises, resurgences and depressions of other seaside towns - partly due to the strict zoning laws prohibiting new building. You can walk the totally undeveloped two-mile boardwalk and watch the crashing ocean from battered gazebos, swim and bask on the white beaches (in summer, compulsory beach tags cost $6 per day, but most guesthouses provide them free) or sit in the shade by the town's namesake, Spring Lake itself. Wooden footbridges, swans and geese, and the grand St Catherine's Catholic Church on the banks of the lake give it the feel of a country village. For the moment, what little activity there is centers on the upmarket shops of Third Avenue.

Bruce Springsteen fans can use the town as a base for visiting nearby ASBURY PARK , a decaying old seaside town where The Boss lived for many years and played his first gigs. Almost nothing remains of the carousels and seaside arcades that Springsteen wrote about on early albums such as his debut Greetings from Asbury Park ; the sole survivor is Madame Marie's fortune-telling salon, which still stands amid the rubble and half-completed condominium developments that line the boardwalk. Also of interest is the Stone Pony , 913 Ocean Ave, where Springsteen played dozens of times in the mid-1970s and to which he returned even after becoming famous, for impromptu jam sessions and, in 1999, for his most recent reunion tour with the E Street Band.