Now that we were warm and waterproof we could head off anywhere - Massachusettes was our oyster or rather our lobster because that’s the local delicacy.
On our first day we headed to Provincetown at the tip of Cape Cod. This is an artists’ retreat and very arty it was too. We declined the opportunity to have a tattoo from a man body sprayed entirely in pink paint and instead browsed the tiny little main street bordered by traditional New England cottages with delightfully rustic front gardens crammed with unruly bright flowers and objects d’art.
We made a detour to view America’s “most photographed” lighthouse. Whilst it was in a very picturesque setting, the lighthouse itself it was a bit of a disappointment, mainly because I’d misread the Guide Book - it was actually only 40ft tall not the 400 we were expecting. Still I was able to quickly redeem myself by spotting a couple of seals frolicking in the waves below. The distraction technique – works every time.
The next day we took the train into Boston and started our tour of the town at Harvard. I like to give the teenager something to aim for. She was suitably impressed so we forked out for a genuine Harvard sweatshirt just in case. We then followed the Freedom Trail around the city streets along with a million local school children obviously on an end of term treat. We managed to lose the school kids and divert off the trail to take lunch in the Italian quarter before heading for some retail therapy (Jack Wills – traditional English “outfitters” and the teenager’s favourite – we really are trying hard for that Parents of the Year award), then a quick glimpse of the original Cheers bar – memories of youthful Friday evenings spent in front of the TV.
The following day the wind had dropped and the skies cleared so we decided to risk the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard, the summer vacation destination of the rich and famous and the setting for Steven Spielberg’s movie Jaws. Fortunately it was early in the season on the Vineyard and it was relatively quiet. In the height of summer you can’t move for the multitudes of wealthy tourists, great white sharks and US presidents. We hired bikes and cycled down the coast to Edgartown where, coincidentally there is yet another Jack Wills store. After purchasing the fancy frock spotted the day before in Boston and lunching on a lobster roll, we cycled back to blustery Oak Bluffs for the 40 minute ferry ride back to the mainland. As the sun was still out we headed quickly home to Plymouth so hubby could light the BBQ.
The sun continued to shine for the next couple of days. The Plymouth mac was rolled away; we sweltered on the local beach; we took long walks along the harbor, we visited Cup Cake Charlies – runner up in TV’s Food Network Cup Cake Wars; we ate an awful lot of seafood and devoured far too much Boston Cream Pie.
On our last day we head to Hyannis for a quick tour of the JFK museum and a visit to the local “Zooquarium” – yes that’s a cross between an aquarium and a zoo. We said hi to a very rare blue lobster in one of the aquarium fish tanks but I could tell I’d been in Cape Cod too long – I was no longer admiring the sea life from a conservation point of view – it was more a question of I wonder what that tastes like …….
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