So it came as a great surprise when, in Destin, the prospect of restoring the shore ran into fierce opposition.
For a while, Mr. Shore ran LongevityDrugstore.com, an online drug retailer that he started, but it went nowhere.
It's not your standard prom after-party; it's an increasingly popular alternative to shore runs and house parties.
Along the middle of the sand, parallel to the shore, runs a row of metal-and-plastic trash barrels set in concrete foundations.
They walked for a long time along the shore, ran up the slippery slope, and found a path where the raspberry bushes emitted a whiff of black damp.
It is still among the longest, with its center span stretching 3,800 feet and its roadway, from shore to shore, running almost five miles.
About 250 people are expected to participate in an annual anniversary run planned by the Jersey Shore Running Club on Tuesday evening.
All this with amazing first-time-ever views from a place a boat has never before been: it is "haze resting on the low shore running out to sea in a vanishing flatness", as Conrad put it.
So far, 17 people are known to have died after the ship hit a submerged rock close to Giglio's shore, ran aground and flopped on its side; 16 were known to be missing.
It was the home shore, running from a sedge fen off the tip of a neighboring island and along a white-pine forest on the mainland to the near side of another island.
