Thursday 23 August: From Martha’s Vineyard to Nantucket.
The “chatty creatures” making the weird noises kept us awake last night too. And when the alarm rang, we had a hard time rolling out of bed. They sound like wood peckers on the bottom on the hull. One starts its tapping noise then others seems to join in, all along the hull! Then 2-3 minutes later it’s all quiet again until the next creature starts it all off again. Weird. Glen will have to take a snorkel at slack tide to see what is growing there. He hasn’t been for a hull inspection since we left Bahamas, 10 weeks ago.
As we prepare breakfast, the wind noise outside gets us to raise an inquiring eyebrow: it wasn’t supposed to be windy today. On the contrary, yesterday’s forecast of sunny and warm weather made us take the bikes out from their storage and put them on charge ready for an excursion around the island today. A quick look at Predict Wind gets us into a dilemma: do we go cycle and get blasted, or we explore by bus, which wouldn’t be as much fun. We decide on neither, instead slip the mooring line and head off to Nantucket. We will use the wind to our advantage as it will take us there nicely.
As we motor out the harbor, we admire yet again the beautiful houses. Anchored just outside the harbor entrance is an impressive super yacht. Soon sails are out, and the 11kts wind gives us 6kts speed. Not bad in this choppy sea. As usual, wind doesn’t last long and in less than an hour we switch on the engine and the watermaker. Sea temperature is now just above 23 Celsius. Whoopee, that’s more like it.
After we turn towards Nantucket, we can sail again. Slowly, but peacefully. Well, as peaceful as it can be with the BBC radio in the background, music interrupted by commercials every other song. We have to go quite a way offshore then head south to the island due to the many shallow sand banks around here. Very similar to the southern North Sea, the ice glaciers ended at this latitude in the ice-age 22,000 years ago and dumped all their moraine, leaving sandy banks and shoals everywhere.
We comment that it feels like sailing into Barbuda: green sea, flat island and from what we see, the shoreline is a long strip of sand. When we enter the channel to Nantucket Harbour it is a bit of a chaos, with barges and motor boats speeding out, and large ferry approaching fast behind us. Hm, very busy little place.
We anchor in just 3.8m of water in the only sheltered harbor on this island. Windy here too, and we get a bit of spray as we dinghy ashore. At the dinghy dock it is absolutely packed, maybe 100 dinghies piled up, 2-3 deep. We manage to tie up and then walk towards the wharf where lots of cottages are hosting little shops or accommodation for tourists.
At first, Nantucket looks rural compared to Martha’s Vineyard. The houses are much smaller, mostly gray from aged shingles, no exterior sign of luxury or glamor. But as we walk through the town, we see such signs, especially on the real estate agents listings! Ridiculous property prices! Since we can’t buy most items exhibited in any of the displays… we settle for an ice cream! Delicious. The town center looks very historical, the old appearance of houses is perfectly complemented by the very uneven cobbled streets.
After a while walking all the streets, we take a bus to Madaket, on the south-west end of the island. We have been told that there we will see the best sunset. There is not much inland on this route, and we are not exactly eager to redo it on bikes. The final bus stop is in front of Millie’s restaurant, where we find large crowds queuing for dinner. We walk few steps towards the beach, which looks unspoiled, only sand dunes and the surf. We are attacked by hundreds of bugs, so after a short walk we run for shelter inside Millie’s. At the bar we sit next to an over-chatty lady, who comes on this island for 25 years, and she tells us about all the places where we should go. We sample the bar’s special drink, some sort of rum punch, which could’ve been very nice if not so over-tasty. … and we miss the sunset!
Back at the bus, there is a long queue, but we do manage to catch the ride. Blasting air-con gets us very chilly, and even after we arrive in town, in the warmer air, we are still shivery. All we want is to return to Cloudy Bay and switch on the heating.
Nantucket photo album
Martha’s Vineyard photo album
Martha’s Vineyard video on Sail Cloudy Bay YouTube channel