Martha's Vineyard, MA

Less than 5 miles from our camping spot at the Falmouth Elks Lodge was the ferry to Martha's Vineyard. We boarded the ferry with six tour bus loads of people.

Tuesday was a beautiful sunny day with temperatures in the mid 60s and the perfect day to spend on the island. Our 45 minute ride took us to Oak Bluffs, a town that was made popular in 1835 for a spiritual revival held amid a grove of oak trees. By 1880, the Methodist revival meeting spot had grown into a summer city of a thousand wood framed cottages and tents that surrounded the tabernacle. The current Tabernacle seats 3,000 and was built in 1879.


The gingerbread cottages replaced the earlier tents but most are not insulated and are used as summer and weekend cottages. There are over 300 cottages on the 36-acre site, that are along walking paths that complete a circle around the tabernacle. Then there will be another row outside the first and so on. The whimsical, brightly painted and well-kept homes bring a flood of tourists to the area. According to one owner we visited with the cottages are selling for about $400,000 but you do not own the land it is on and have a one year lease. If you do not keep the property up then they don't renew the lease.



The Vineyard Transit Authority offers reasonable service to all six of the towns on the island but we chose to only visit two. For a mere $1 each we were transported to Edgartown. Here the architecture changes dramatically and in this town, established in 1642, one finds large white houses. The town grew in the 17th and 18th centuries and was a major whaling port by 1825. The whaling captains built large homes as the profit from trade with China and whaling brought huge fortunes to the island. Many of the existing houses were built from 1830 to 1845. We enjoyed walking and looking.

This house belonged to Captain Valentine Pease, supposedly the whaler that author Herman Melville used as a prototype for Captain Ahab in Moby Dick. The house was built between about 1836. Melville sailed on Pease's whaler in 1841.

The giant Pagoda tree was brought from the orient in 1833 and planted on the island. It shaded Captain Milton's home, built in 1840.

The Old Whaling Church is a Greek Revival building built in 1843. It has a 92 foot clock tower which can be seen far out to sea.

On Dock Street we lunched near the ferry to Chappaquidick, known as Chappy to the locals.

The Edgartown lighthouse was not far away.

We ended the awesome day by driving over to the Hyannisport area where we just happened upon the Kennedy compound. One would think we were tracking down former presidents.