North Myrtle Beach Times Serving our Community and the Grand Strand for over 50 years
By Ruben Lowman
The Easter Bunny will return once more to McLean Park in North Myrtle Beach on Saturday, where he will make a special stop to visit with local children, handing out candy, taking selfies and ensuring that they have a wonderful holiday experience for the 40thyear.
The park, located in the heart of the city beside Main Street, will make for the perfect backdrop for the city’s 40th Annual Easter Egg Hunt, where local kids of all ages can get out and search for colored eggs, get candy, play fun games and hang out with the bunny himself.
“This year we are anticipating around 1,000 children and their families to attend the event and we are looking forward to seeing each of them!” said Angel Sylvester, NMB Parks and Recreation Special Events & Program Director.
The egg hunt festivities will be held next Saturday, April 16, with the hunt beginning at 10 a.m. sharp, so be sure to arrive early as parking is limited around the Ocean Drive park.
The first hunt was held to have a family-oriented event in a city that at that time was overrun with college students on spring break. There were between 50 and 100 kids for that first hunt, which has grown to 1,000 annually. Every Easter around 7,000 colored eggs are scattered around McLean in six separate areas, where children scramble and search to their hearts content in hopes of finding them. Children are divided up for each area by age, into groups of: two and under; three and four years old; five and six year old; seven and eight years old; nine and ten years old; and 11 and over.
After they collect all their eggs in their basket, kids can exchange them for specially-made goody bags and then take part in all the rest of the activities on the day. Sylvester said they have an extra special new feature to the festivities that will be sure to keep the kids entertained.
“This year we are debuting the Bunny Photo Hop around McLean Pond. Families will have the opportunity to take a stroll around the pond and visit a few small photo shoot spots provided by NMB Parks and Recreation,” Sylvester explained. “We will also have a new Build-A-Bunny family decorating contest starting at 10:30 a.m. after the Easter Egg Hunt. This contest is sure to make the whole family laugh. Sign ups for the contest will be available the day of the event.”
For locals, the egg hunt is a can’t-miss family tradition for going on four decades. As a native son of the city of North Myrtle Beach, I can remember coming to the egg hunt every year with my father and older brother and sister. It was a special experience for us as a family, a time to bond over the holiday and have some fun while doing it. Sylvester said many families in the local community are no different, making the egg hunt one of the most loved and cherished events on their calendar each year.
“It has become a staple in the NMB community because many parents (and some grandparents!) remember attending the event and want to share the same experiences with their little ones,” Sylvester said. “We hope the families will enjoy the new additions to the Easter Egg Hunt this year and continue to return for years to come.”
Helping to create family traditions is an essential part of being in parks and recreation, Sylvester said, and it brings the entire department so much joy to see all the smiling faces on event day, many of which they’ve seen for years as they’ve grown up.
“It is so special to know what an impact our team has on such fond family memories,” Sylvester said. “When we are planning an event, our goal is to think of how we can make something more special and more memorable to each of the families who take time to come out and enjoy an event with us!
Sylvester said she encourages everyone to share their experience at the egg hunt and taking selfies around McLean with the Easter Bunny to the parks department’s social media pages after the event, as it helps the city to continuously tweak their events to bring the most fun to residents.
“You can find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Tik Tok,” Sylvester said. “We love to see your smiling faces and hear your feedback so we can continue to make our events so special.”
