From Great Neck to Wading River
Drive slowly along the quiet back roads of Long Island's north shore and you just might hear it: the faint murmur of a rollicking party, with ghostly musicians stirring up hot jazz as bootleg liquor flows as freely as the wealth. The towns that line the coast have been inhabited by some of America's richest citizens for decades, and that still holds true. Towns like Great Neck and Sea Cliff have cute village centers, while just outside their borders lie homes of mammoth proportions. Drive along Route 25A into Suffolk County and the towns become even cuter: Northport, Stony Brook, and Port Jefferson give new meaning to the word quaint.
The Gold Coast, as it came to be known in the Roaring Twenties, was the domain of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. The area was famous for its glorious excess in everything from mansions to parties. It is where America's most powerful tycoons -- bearing names like Astor and Vanderbilt -- bought up to 1,000 acres of land and built 100-room mansions based on English manor houses and French châteaux. While fox hunts are a thing of the past, and the Long Island Expressway now cuts through many of those former estates, some of these homes still remain and can be glimpsed on a drive, along with great views of Long Island Sound. Start in the exclusive community of Great Neck and drive along the main road, Route 25A; its two lanes are responsible for moving tons of traffic. Continue east and the cars start to dissipate. You'll come to Sagamore Hill, Theodore Roosevelt's summer home. Pass through sleepy Centerport and eventually the terrain becomes even more rural, with farms cropping up as you approach the North Fork.
A word of advice for beach lovers: Stick with the south shore. The few beaches that do exist on the north shore tend to be on the rocky side.
