New England - July 2013

Christie and I sailed Galadriel up the coast from Norfolk to New England in July with John Spruill and my son Edward. The trip up was uneventful (a lot of motorsailing) except for the fishing. We caught a large ocean bluefish, a mahi and for the first time, hooked up with about a 30 lb. yellow fin tuna. Much to my dismay, when I gaffed him he gave a mighty heave and pulled the gaff out of my hand and to the bottom it went. A moment later, he threw the hook.
We dropped Edward off and picked up John’s wife, Rae, in Newport and spent the next 10 days visiting Newport, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket and Block Island; in between trips to the Hinckley yard for repairs.

The Newport mooring field was large and busy. Newport is a pretty cool place. Lots of good places to eat and things to do, if you’re looking for action. Like Annapolis on steroids.

As we approached Martha’s Vineyard from the southwest the famous white cliffs of Aquinnah (aka Gay Head) came into view.

Compared to Newport, the Martha’s Vineyard anchorage/mooring field is relatively sedate.

We hired a tour driver to give us the island tour- “leave no stone unturned,” as John said. The island is beautiful, the town is quaint and the tour was worth doing. An added point of interest was the fact that the movie JAWS was filmed here. It was really cool to see all the spots where the scenes from the movie were filmed. They still have a big shark tournament each year and the waters really are full of “great whites”. Didn’t go swimming off the fantail in the harbor here!

A cool sculpture welcomed us to the beach.

Another view of the Aquinnah cliffs.

The small (and shallow) Menemsha harbor, where Quint docked his fishing boat in Jaws. It still serves as a marina for swordfishing and other shallow draft boats.  

Unfortunately we discovered that in the summer, large ferries arrive every hour, delivering thousands of tourists to the island for the day. The island, which has a very small year round population, is overwhelmed and frankly the crowds ruined the experience for me. They should tie the number of visitors to what the island overnight lodgings can handle and limit day visitors in some way.

We spent a couple of nights in Vineyard Haven harbor then headed northeast up the western shore toward Nantucket.

On Nantucket we rented mopeds and toured much of the island. Unfortunately, after riding all day in the sun, my legs swelled up.

If possible, Nantucket was even cuter than MV. The architecture of all the homes and businesses is strictly controlled. It almost felt like a New England version of Williamsburg. Unfortunately, it had the same problem of being overrun by tourists as MV.

The Nantucket harbour houses.

The water is chilly and full of sharks and the wind is brisk on the windward side of the island, ensuring that only the truly hardy or the young and stupid actually go in the water.

Unfortunately, our only encounter with Block Island was when we broke down there on the way home. After hearing how great it is many times from friends who have vacationed there, I was disappointed. My impression was that it is a lower end, redneck version of the other New England islands. Admittedly, we didn't see much of the island because I was too busy soliciting assistance from the pretend mechanics at the main marina there. Hence no pictures.