Vineyard Baby

Getting to Martha's Vineyard yesterday was fun but hard work! My friend Corinna and I used almost every means of popular transport to travel by land, air and water - the metro, then a train, then a flight, then a shuttle to the ferry which led to an hour and a half journey in wonderful weather with bracing winds culminating in a couple of slightly seasick girls descending upon Oak Bluffs, MV. We were met with an offer of cocktails on the harbour which worked a treat! The picture is of me on the ferry by the way. Note the wonderful tan which hides the peakiness under my eyes.

This morning was another day of wonderful, sunny weather. Corinna and I took the bus from Aquinnah where her parents have a gorgeous house with a view of Vineyard Sound from their huge front deck, to Edgartown. We had lunch on the harbour there at the Seafood Shanty. I had a wonderful Shrimp and Scallop linguine with a coke and tried a spoonful of Corinna's clam chowder. Here's the linguine! Although the food was wonderful, it was just a great place to be with fantabulous views of the harbour, the water and there was a great bar upstairs. The service was also fantastic, with the floor manager coming around and introducing herself to each table, asking us how our meal was and to let her know if there was any problem.












What followed was a trip to the Vineyard's Museum on School Street. For the price of $7 we spent about half an hour finding out about the Vineyard's rich and varied history from making its money from the arduous industry of whaling in the 17 and 1800s to its African-American heritage, the Wampanaog tribe of native American Indians living in Aquinnah to the influx of the Portuguese in the early 1900s, the development of the Methodist campgrounds in Oak Bluffs into the famous Gingerbread houses to the infamous Aquinnah cliffs that bear evidence of MV's geological history when it was entirely underwater to when it was first made into an island 500 years ago when glacial melt separated the existing island surface from mainland Massachussets. If you do visit, don't miss the Fresnel lens sitting majestically in the frontyard or the headstones of Clare Luce's hens.


We ended out trip at the Vineyard by popping into Mad Martha's for a couple of scoops. Mine was Maple Walnut and Blueberry - both equally made in heaven with huge chunks of walnut and entire blueberries in purple ice-cream. Out of this world! As for the story of how Mad Martha got her name - I'll have to save something for next time!