As we close out another wildly successful year at Patch, we thought we'd take a look at some of the surprise stories that garnered big attention from our readers.
Here's a short list of those not-necessarily-local, but nearby, stories that you viewed the most:
1.) PHOTOS: Boat Struggles In Shark River Inlet:
These photos of a boat nearly capsizing while fighting the rough surf ahead of Hurricane Sandy were enormously popular, and for good reason.
Find out what's happening in Manasquan-Belmarwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
2.) Butterflies Fluttering By: Red Admirals "Irrupting'' All Over The Place: This one stunned us, honestly. One day, we noticed an abundance of butterflies, so we made a couple of phone calls and wrote a quick story. Apparently, everyone else in the known world was noticing the same thing, because this was one of the most popular stories of the year.
3.) VIDEO: Venus Transit 2012 from Super Hi-Def NASA Camera: Space. It's the final frontier, someone once said, and it still holds the fascination of lots of people, as evidenced by the popularity of this story.
Find out what's happening in Manasquan-Belmarwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
4.) PHOTOS: Space Shuttle Enterprise Sails to Intrepid Museum: See what we mean? Space. Popular.
5.) This story about the misidentification of a Hoboken man as the shooter in Newtown, Conn., garnered a top spot on the list.
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