Mathews County is in the running for the "Smallest Cool Towns 2014" contest, sponsored by budgettravel.com, and has received high accolades from its residents and visitors from afar.

Mathews Visitor and Information Center director Ann Miller said the website is set up so people can vote for Mathews, or any other town of their choosing, with a population less than 10,000, every 24 hours from the same computer.

"As a tourism director, the greatest satisfaction I receive is reading the comments that are posted on the site by individuals when they vote," Miller said. "It definitely illustrates what a wonderful small town we live in, and why people keep coming back for visits, and telling their friends to do likewise."

As of Friday, Mathews had received over 830 votes and nearly 60 comments of support from interested voters.

Among some of the comments listed on the site are, "Life on the Chesapeake Bay of Virginia does not get better than in Mathews," according to Port Haywood res...