Before this past weekend my experience with Coney Island was limited to two distinct experiences.

1) Hearing Goodbye My Coney Island Baby as a part of a barbershop group in high school. Not so much unlike:

Goodbye, My Coney Island Baby

That man’s face at 1:06 is pretty incredible.

2) Some reality show where a Coney Island “freak” got a tattoo of a rubber chicken on his leg done by an amateur tattoo artist. It was pretty ugly. This is also how I acquired my knowledge of The Wonder Wheel and Nathan’s famous hot dogs (and infamous annual 4th-of-July hot dog eating contest). When we went this past Friday the record was 66 hot dogs in 10 minutes. Apparently that record was broken Saturday by Joey Chesnut, who ate an astonishing 68 hot dogs.

"After the second minute I knew my body was cooperating," Chestnut said. "It was such a good day. I've never eaten that many before."

That’s in the neighborhood of 21,000 calories in 10 minutes, which is gross. I wonder what training looks like…

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgqbCq_sxmo]

Other than that I had no preconceptions about Coney Island. But, as I said, Friday we decided to check it out.

It was packed like Disney World, but not nearly so pristine. It didn’t try to be. There were exhibits such as “Shoot the Freak” at which people paid to shoot paintballs at a kid in body armor, then there were other freak shows and magic acts, the Barnum & Bailey/Ringling Brothers circus, the Cyclone roller coaster, the Wonder Wheel, Nathan’s hot dogs (expensive, but tasty and paired with ridiculously cheap beer!), a baseball park, and of course, the boardwalk, beach, and pier! We didn’t hit up all the attractions, but between Nathan’s, the pier, the baseball game, and fireworks it was a great day!

Here’s a photo gallery of the day!

Bing and Jay (my roommate), both former acting apprentices, in front of the Wonder Wheel!

Nathan's famous hot dogs. Site of the annual 4th-of-July hot dog eating contest.

The view from the pier. I wish you could feel the breeze. It was the best part!

Here's the majority of our crew! (Left to right: Sara Wolkowitz, Chris Moore, Allison Moy, Steven Rausch, Jay Lee, Matthew Baldiga)

We watched the Cyclones come back to win the baseball game in the bottom of the 9th!

And ended the evening with firework on the Coney Beach!

Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed it!

~db