This is why Atlantic Beach Bikefest is 'like coming home'

Sitting on the porch of the Evans Motel in Atlantic Beach, Jane Evans and her 8-year-old granddaughter, Layla Leaks, watch the bikes go by, with the ocean on the horizon, surrounded by mom-and-pop motels and campers.

The motel sits a block away from the main drag where vendors and motorcycles line the street as people walk along, enjoying each other's company and dancing to music.

"Here, in Atlantic Beach, we have groups that have been coming ever since the date that they started Bikefest, so it's like home for them," Evans said. "You leave the beach, but you can't take it out of the soul."

Evans said the event has continued to grow, getting better each year.

"It's indescribable what I feel, what they feel when they come here, to the beach," Evans said. "It's just something that we live for and we have this weekend to remember what Atlantic Beach is all about."

And for Evans, Atlantic Beach is about family, freedom and unity.

The event was started by the Carolina Night Riders club about 50 years, said Regina Claybrook, a member of the Country Boys Riders bike club from North Carolina.

Throughout the weekend, many bikers make the drive to Atlantic Beach for the historical side to Bikefest.

"I don't go any further than Atlantic Beach because this is where Bikefest started, this is where it was created, so I don't got no business over that way," Claybrook said.

On the first night of the event, people showed up from as far as California.

Roan Bloomfield took three days to drive across the country to set up a stand where he sells drinks made out of fresh pineapples.

"I heard it's the last black beach for the black Americans," Bloomfield said. "That was stunning to me. Even over on the West Coast, there's no black beach. That's why I'm here. To bring my natural stuff here to make them."

For other bikers, the trip to Atlantic Beach is just one stop in their drive across the Grand Strand.

"I always go back and forth between north and south beach, Ocean Boulevard to Kings Highway," said Jason Youot, from Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

But, Youot said, the stop in Atlantic Beach is his favorite part of the trip.

"It's a beautiful thing to see African Americans come together without no issues or anything and to enjoy ourselves," he said.

This story was originally published May 25, 2018 at 7:10 PM with the headline "This is why Atlantic Beach Bikefest is 'like coming home'."