New at Virginia Beach

It’s time to return to Virginia Beach. If your memories revolve around crowded T-shirt shacks and gritty mom-and-pop motels, you’re in for a big surprise. This vacation magnet (your grandparents may have met here!) now sports a fresh style. It’s nudged the beach bum culture aside for upscale hotels and condos, good restaurants, fun shops, and sparkling high-rises.

Don’t worry. You can still relax in flip-flops and cutoff jeans in most places. The oyster bars, beach bands, and miniature golf courses with silly dinosaurs still thrive. Meanwhile polished businesses have opened that show a better look. Here’s our guide to the best.

Stay and Play

A 3-mile row of high-rise hotels and condos overflows with sun-loving guests from Memorial Day to Labor Day. To the east of these tall blocks of lodging, a boardwalk and a separate bike path hug an amazingly wide stretch of flat silver beach. To the west, Atlantic Avenue, a four-lane thoroughfare, jams with cruising vacationers reveling in the colorful scene.

At first glance, Virginia Beach―the state’s largest city―seems the same from year to year. Take a closer look for an entirely new and vibrant scene.

The crowds still flock here (Southwest’s affordable flights arrive in Norfolk, just 20 minutes away). Others make the drive. Parking is easier with two new garages at 9th and 31st Streets. For only $3 a day, the trolley delivers visitors to shops, restaurants, and their favorite public beach access.

Another constant is the stream of patrons at one of the country’s most visited Dairy Queens at 17th Street Fishing Pier. But now you have choices. For a cool treat with a wider range of flavors and homemade taste, be a maverick and try Kohr Bros. Frozen Custard across the street.