The signs that we would have a fantastic beach week with my family started early.

First of all, we saw something we have not seen in ages on our ride down to the Delaware shore – the absence of lines at the Bay Bridge toll plaza. I almost didn’t know what to do when I had the opportunity to drive right up and pay my toll.

We have tried a number of different strategies to try and beat the bridge traffic, all of them abject failures. We just had an abundance of good fortune this time.

Then, we had very few delays along the way. We had a little stop-and-go in a few familiar places, but nothing that really put us behind schedule.

Finally, we had smooth sailing on an alternate route laid out by my brother-in-law to help us avoid construction on the main road leading to our destination.

Since any week at the beach with my family ranks as a good beach week, I saw all these small moments as evidence that we might write a few pages in the family history this time around.

We had much of the same fun as we have had other years. We played the family cornhole tournament, albeit with a smaller field due to some scheduling conflicts. We sat around and talked as long as we could on the beach. We ate a whole mess of crabs one night, so many that the place where my sister buys them informed her that we are the largest order they have to fill all summer.

And all of this on a somewhat down year since some folks could not come down due to my niece’s wedding, which took place on the final day of our vacation. We stayed the whole time at our rental and changed at my sister’s before heading to the ceremony. That’s beach week dedication.

While we did all of those usual things, we also created some new memories.

For the second straight year, a heavy rainstorm flooded the street in front of one of the houses where my sister and her family were staying. That meant we had another opportunity to get the kayaks out from her rental house and patrol the flooded street.

I didn’t take part this year, but to see my nieces and nephews paddling down a residential street once again made me pretty happy.

We also got a chance to mess with one of the lifeguards on the beach, a new family activity. After we saw him input his phone number into the cell phones of multiple attractive young ladies, we sent two of my elementary-school age great nieces to see if they could get his digits. He liked knowing that he was playing to an appreciative crowd.

In the end, however, it’s not about those momentary jokes or how to deal with a quick rainstorm. Beach week means hours sitting on a beach chair with the people who know you best, sharing stories, trading gossip or putting food and other assorted items on the heads of those who fall asleep on their beach towel so someone else can take a picture and put it on Facebook for all the world to see.

That’s what makes vacation with family so special.