Overrated and run down. Not sure what all the hype is about. Restaurants are ok if you can get into one. Grocery stores are lacking and the gift shops sell all the same things . For whatever reason we had a lot of trouble getting into any type of restaurant. We visited seabrook which is a 30 minute drive and it's worth the visit. If you choose to come know that it will be cold and windy in the middle of July. We thought it would be warmer, poor planning on our part. We don't plan on coming back . You're not missing anything by not coming here. Lots of cute deer roaming around so if you choose to, drive carefully. read more

Awesome place to go for the beach. Really beautiful. Large gathering here on 4th of July with fireworks all night. Driving is permitted on the beach at your own risk. If you don't want to park on the beach, there is parking available at the entrance by the public restrooms. There is also parking open at the convention center nearby. read more

We spent Saturday on Memorial weekend in Ocean Shores. It was a busy weekend and the city had locked all the public bathrooms and the single outhouse by the main beach entrance. People were in long lines until they realized none of the bathroom doors were opening. Elderly, disabled, young and old were left trying to find a place to use the restroom. It was sad watching an elderly man with a cane slowly make his way to the bathroom only to realize they were closed. People were using the sand dunes as their personal bathrooms. Only the restaurants in Ocean Shores offer bathroom to customers. We had to buy something and use the McDonalds bathroom, which the women's bathroom was down to 1 working toilet. Subway has only 1 bathroom each for men and women. We normally walk the stores and shop then go out to dinner on our beach trips. We chose not to support the businesses and drove an hour and 40 minutes to eat dinner in our hometown. We normally have our beautiful beach days in Long Beach, but decided to go to Ocean Shores due to us leaving a little late. Never again. The city's failure to provide bathroom facilities is unacceptable! Honestly the town is very run down. The city vibe could be best described in one word "depressing". read more

Typical beach town. Boardwalky. Perfect place to go to get away from the city for a while. The beach is so calming and relaxing and there are miles and miles of it to walk on. You can go on a horse back ride or if you've got good tires and a hearty vehicle go driving on the beach. *NOTE* Please don't drive on the beach if you have a souped up mobile or a Too fast Too furious car with the lower-riding and such because chances are you'll get stuck. I spent 30 minutes with 7 other people pushing and shoving trying to get a 2 dr Honda Civic as well as a 2 Dr Ford Focus out of the sand. The Focus tried to help the Civic by pushing it and both got stuck. Then a man with a F350 helped get the Focus out and I with my Escape helped get the Civic out. Soooooo lame & embarrassing. There are plenty of restaurants and little shops to get gifts or beachwear or rent leisure items while at the beach. And plenty of bungalows and hotels to welcome you to the escapism of Ocean Shores read more

The ocean is beautiful. Wish I would've came down when I was a little busy to see what it was actually like down here. I will definitely be returning with my spouse, scenery is gorgeous. You can actually drive your car up near the beach which is very neat. I've never known a Ocean you can do that on. read more

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The thing most often praised about this beach is you can drive on it. But if you're trying to have a pleasant walk, cars speeding by isn't great. The beach is featureless. When the hard-packed sand ends high on the beach, dead dry grass makes it look like the rest of the place is the prairie. The most interesting things we saw were a dead bird squashed and very smelly, its feathers scattered in a wide circle. And a crashed kite some kid abandoned. We went on a slow day so at least it wasn't crowded. Sometimes, at the height of summer, it's just one big parking lot. People drive right down to the water's edge, so really, parking lot car beside car beside car, everywhere, filling the place up. On this most recent visit though, probably only about ten cars, as it was overcast and didn't bring out the beer-guzzling rubes and their smelly pick-up trucks with the bottoms rusted out from visiting Ocean Shores. There are no rocks, hardly even pebbles, though I did spot three polished stones one of which I put in my pocket. Don't generally expect to look for seashells or driftwood because such a well-used beach won't have any left if it ever had any at all (it's not a beach conducive to any sort of wildlife beyond whatever scuds might eat dead birds). However, I unexpectedly found one piece of driftwood in that broad sterile environment, and it was actually quite beautiful. A pet lizard will now be using it for basking. It's nice to see horses trotting down a beach, much nicer than cars racing for sure. For such a famous beach it's just not much. Dungeness or Westport are so much more beautiful to walk along, but Ocean Shores lets you bring your dog, the only reason we ever go there, and may continue to do so only because dogs are banned from too many beaches. read more

Our kids special request this destination for birthday trips. It's a whole thing with Sharky's and sushi at Uni. And we have now added Peppermint Parlor and the beach. It's a cute little town with little town activities. read more

Overall, this is a great beach in my opinon. This is a beach that you can drive onto with your vehicle, which we loved. There seem to be two main roads leading to the beach. One is at Damon Road and the other is on a road that is right passes by the Best Western hotel. The one closer to Damon road seemed to have more cars and people in my opinion. My husband loved that we could drive on the beach and since we had a truck we could drive a ways to be more secluded and away from others. I love that this beach stretches on for miles and miles. It was really nice to sit in the back of the truck with the tailgate down and/or set out lawn chairs and just watch the waves. Many people pack things for the day and enjoy the day at the beach. Items that we saw people bring were barbeques, hammocks, kites, sand toys for kids, tents to block the wind, etc. You can go clamming here as well. You can also ride mopeds or electric bikes and ride horses on the beach. The only reason I would give this 4 stars instead of 5 is that it can get packed with cars when you enter the beach, especially at the entrance along Damon Road. If you have four wheel drive or a truck you will be able to drive out farther and get away from the crowd on busy warm days in the summer. We loved that we were able to have more space by driving out farther. One thing that bothered me was that a horse company takes people up and down the beach continuously all day. That part did not bother me per say, although they are clearly work horses meant to bring money in. No one seems to pick up the horse poop in a timely fashion and it sits there. People have to drive or walk around it. As the tide came in, horse poop was swept out to sea by the waves. I personally find it negligent that this company is making a killing off of people and is not picking up after themselves and polluting the water. I wish that someone would hold them more responsible to help keep the beach and ocean clean for all those wanting to enjoy the beach. read more

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Beautiful little town! This was my first visit to Ocean Shores and we of course decide to go on one of the busiest weekends, Labor Day. To our surprise the beach wasn't over crowded. It was a perfect temperature not to cold and not to warm but very windy we were kinda bummed because the smoke from local fires swept in shortly after arriving but it didnt chase us off. There is plenty of camping spots and a couple really nice hotels if you want to stay in the area as well as several cute restaurants and shops. This is for sure one of my new favorite places. My rating would have been 5 stars but the bathrooms here were very nasty, It was the only down side. read more

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Today was my first trip to Ocean Shores and we loved it. I refuse to give less stars based on the weather lol come on, we're in the PNW in February. It was foggy, overcast, 52 degrees and beautiful! The seagulls were out in full force and I found my first fully intact Sand Dollar today, woohoo! There were only about 10 people on a mile stretch of beach which is the way I like it. You can drive right up to and onto the beach here! Ocean Shores as a city is charming in its coastal quaintness, friendly locals, clean streets, and older Americana decor. It has a relaxed feel and a variety of shops and restaurants to enjoy. My favorite coastal town is Newport OR but I'm making room for Ocean Shores, WA : ) read more

Ocean Shores Beach - Ocean Shores, WA beach - Beaches Near Me - Ocean Shores, Washington

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Part of my car club came here for our day event at the beach and I rode co pilot in one of their cars, after finally entering the city on a day that was supposed to be cloudy but ended giving up blue skies was a perfect prelude to an amazing day. The beach wasn't too crowded and our event actually yielded a decent amount of cars as we were expecting a low turnout. All the shops and boutiques were very nice, I enjoyed exploring and wish I had more time. I did notice that the city is very small so I wouldn't stay for more than a weekend unless you are doing some sort of event. Driving on that beach was fun! You witness a lot of people letting there cars loose on the sand. Worth coming for a day or two! read more

Ocean Shores Beach - Hanging out near our cars! - Beaches Near Me - Ocean Shores, Washington

First, to clarify. This review is only regarding the beach--not any businesses within Ocean Shores, nor the city itself. The Ocean itself is beautiful....supposing you can overlook the beach. I was sad to find, that like other Yelp reviewers, the beach is not welcoming. When my companion and I first started our trek to the beach, we encounted a bench spray painted with the words "West Side" in gang type lettering. We laughed a bit. Even made some jokes on what kind of gangs inhabit the Ocean beaches (Starfish? Crabs? Birds?). Anyways, I wish I would have taken a picture of it as it would go great with my review. Anxious to put my toes in the water I ran right towards the waves. MISTAKE. I arrived to a muddy mess. Turning around, I began to notice what other yelp reviewers had. Dead birds. Big Dead Gulls. Never have I seen something like this at an ocean beach. My companion and I walked quite aways down the beach and found a place that was somewhat clean and farther away from public entry places. We played some frisbee and settled down for a nap on the sand. It was then that things went all gangster on us. A large Gull flew right above our heads, squaking at us it landed just in front of us. Following him/her were several other large gulls that conveniently created a circle around us. They all began squaking and moving towards us. I take it we had found ourselves in THE WEST SIDE. As we started to leave, the Gulls escorted us out. We heard the Gull's message loud and clear: We are not welcome there. No worries, we will not return. read more

Supposed to be reopened but many resturants either closed or so short handed you cant phone in an order or even order to go at the resturant. Had to get subway and owner said he was short of everything we could not even get a bag to put food in read more

I would rate Ocean Shores as 3 1/2 stars. We were here during the weekday periods, so it wasn't busy at all. There are limited places to ship or eat, but we were able to rent a place with a kitchen, so there is plenty of seafood to buy and cook yourself. At the beach, you are actually able to drive onto it, so it can be both a pro and a con. If you have a car, you can drive a few minutes north of the main area and get your own private beach. Overall, it is a good place to get away (about three hours from Seattle), especially when the weather is hot. read more

Today the overcast along with the sun leaves the ocean un viewable. However this place is so relaxing. The sounds of water hitting sand. The ocean smells,misty chilly air can't be beat. I love this place. Stop by the store(520) and grab some brownies or cookies. I had the lemonade. It was good. It made my ocean going experience enjoyable. read more

Ocean Shores Beach - Parking on the sand. - Beaches Near Me - Ocean Shores, Washington

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We enjoy going to the ocean. People were doing everything from attending conferences to picking mushrooms and digging clams. We went to the Cranberry Festival in Grayland. The thing I 'm always disappointed by, ate the lack of good local restaurants. The best local food to work with... But the food is just never very good when you go out to eat. And... Nightlife is non- existent. We tried a local bar last night ... But the 70's lights and canned music were too much for us. If you do enough fun things during the day... I guess you go to bed early! We also Saw many people disappointed that places were closed on Columbus Day! read more

me and my friend were driving down there with my friends mom but in a different car. My friend's mom wanted to rent the electric bikes so we went there and went into the parking lot and just sat there in the car listening to music. The music was a little loud but we thought as if no one was around us. The car next to us had a dude in the backseat and he honked and told us to shut up. We then turned down the music and then my friends mom came so we went to ride the bikes, came back and the dude was still there. we got in the car ready to leave and he had his phone out and started recording us at first we thought he was watching something but once we pulled out of the parking spot his phone followed us while pulling out. we then stopped and rolled down the window as my friend said sir why are you recording us is there a problem. I then go and start telling him stop recording us because that's weird he doesn't say anything and we continue to leave. Everyone in this city is a bunch of bitchy people and wouldn't recommend going. Completely ruined me and my friends fun and me and her never wanna come back here again! read more

Wheelchair user alert! I am a traveler who uses a wheelchair, and we had a lot of difficulty navigating Ocean Shores. Firstly, there are no sidewalks between most of the buildings, which makes going from shop to shop down the main drag a challenge. There's also little to no shoulder to speak of, and what there is is primarily gravel. We ended up driving in the street some of the time because we got sick of driving to one store, then packing up the chair and driving to the next one. In addition, most of the driveways and parking areas are gravel, and loose gravel at that, which is very challening for wheelchairs and mobility scooters to navigate. Most of the buildings had ramp access, which is great, but many of the entrance thresholds were so high we had to turn around and back in to enter, which is always kind of embarassing. There was a good selection of shops, and even the "touristy" ones had a decent variety in their kitchy wares. There's also a good selection of local artisan products and fun activities to do on the beach. We spent a week here with our 2-year-old and were not lacking in activities, but the workaround with the poor planning for wheelchair access is something we wish we had planned for. read more

Fun to walk along the beach. Very popular location so you won't be alone. Use caution driving your vehicle on the sand. Water too cold to officially swim but still beautiful. Air temperature can get very cold with the wind coming off the ocean. Be sure to stay for the sunset. read more

It's a place I run to when I need to destress... my dog loves the beach area where it's a never ending run for her.... it's a bit chilly though and wish there was a walk way off of the sand like Longbeach... read more

Great little resort town with a great beach. Has a few nice restaurants and hotels to stay in. Many to choose from. Quinault Beach Resort is just down the road and during the summer you can look forward to miles of fireworks a and many weekend events. read more

I'm not sure how anyone could give this city less than four stars. My grandmother and I come every year and absolutely love it. It's no Palm Springs but it is the perfect get away for a relaxing stay. Very homey atmosphere and it's very nice to see local shops owned by local people. The beach is very clean and peaceful. read more