Random Road Trip Ruby. Click on RUBY TUESDAY for more red shots. RUBY TUESDAY is hosted by Mary at Work of the Poet.
This boat with a name that seems like very good advice was moored in the harbor at New Bedford Massachusetts. Click on the underlined words to read our post about the historical part of this charming village, one of our favorite roadtrip stops.
For Watery Wednesday, here is a Splashback (sorry, couldn't resist) to our visit last month to Martha's Vineyard. This is the beach road on Chappaquiddick Island.
We drove part of the way along the beach on Chappy and then parked (at the Mitoi Gardens) and took a guided Jeep ride the rest of the way (you need a permit to drive the whole way).
As long-time Oregonians, it always seems odd to us to drive along the beach.
Oregon beaches -- which are all open to the public -- are not open to vehicles and even though we've been on many beaches in many states where driving is OK, it is always strange to us.
We also saw quite a few lighthouses on this trip -- but this one on Chappaquiddick is the only one I climbed! (The only other one that was open to clkimbing was the Cape Hatteras -- and it was 100 degrees that day -- so no climbing!
This one wasn't as tall, but it was fun to climb. (Bill sat the climb out. He is allergic to narrow-stepped ladders, ever since he fell off of one and permanently damaged his foot.)
The picture below is one view from the top.
This interesting spot was a recent stop on our roadtrip -- which is our world right now. For more world views visit the links on That's My World.
It looks like a charmed gingerbread village. According to the Martha's Vineyard Camp Meeting Association Website, it is, in fact, the most perfectly preserved collection of Carpenter Gothic style architecture in the world.
In mid-nineteen century America, religious camp meetings were popular. Church congrations would come to a common location for a week or two during the summer, to listen to preaching and sing and worship together.
The first camp meeting here in Wesleyan Grove was held in 1835. At first, ministers would preach from a makeshift stand. In 1869, a huge tent was erected and this iron tabernacle was erected on that site in 1879. According to its website, Wesleyan Grove was founded by Methodists, but over time has become interdenominational. We noticed on a schedule that non-religious concerts and community events are also held in the tabernacle.
At first, each congregation visiting from the mainland would have its own tent, and all of them would be arranged in a semi-circle on the park green.
Over time, families began leasing land to pitch their own individual tents. By the 1860s and 1870s, the family tents had been replaced with permanent wooden cottages. At one time, there were about 500, today there are just over 300.
Again according to its website, the Campground today is a community of mostly summer residents who value the intimacy created by the crowding of cottages on small tent lots. Many have been owned by the same families for generations.
Residents must be approved by the Campground Association's Board and must have an appreciation for the special traditions of which they are a part. (We would add that residents would have to not mind tourists practically peeking through their windows.) The house below is said to be the most photographed home here.
This post is linked to Weekend Reflections hosted by James and Shadow Shot Sunday hosted by Tracy
This quiet and serene Japanese Garden is on Chappy Island, Martha's Vineyard.
Mitoi doesn't translate from the Japanese. The man who designed it spent so much time in his garden that he referred to it as his "toy." He named it as it is spelled today.
The garden was donated to the Trustees of Reservations, a Massachusetts group formed to secure heritage places throughout the State. It is maintained by volunteers.
LINKED TO WATERY WEDNESDAY -- lots of beautiful water pictures over there!
Here we are heading for Martha's Vineyard on a bright but breezy day. We were on a freight ferry, so we stayed in the car, since there was was no upper deck. But we were the first car on, so we had a great view anyway.
Some of these beach "cabins" are just a little larger than ones we've seen before.
We arrived too early to check in to our camp site and so we drove around exploring a bit and found this lovely unnamed cove with a beach to walk around. We ate lunch while enjoying the view.
This post is linked to Skywatch Friday. Go there to see beautiful skies. Also Linked to EveryDay Life.
We stayed near one of the "quaint little villages" in old Cape Cod and we watched this full moon from our campsite -- near the Bay!
Click this link to go to the official Cape Cod page,
where you will find a video of Miss Patti Page, the singing rage, performing her 1957 hit song, which apparently is still the official song of the region! It's pretty fun to listen to this hit from our high school days!
Life was so much simpler back in the dark ages, when we were teen-agers. Can you imagine anyone any younger than we are loving this song -- or dancing to it?
Cape Cod does not, by the way, in any way at all remind us of the little Eastern Washington towns where we were born (this is not a bad thing). It did look a lot like parts of the Oregon Coast -- the parts where you can't actually see the ocean from the highway.
We explored from one end of the Cape to the other, but we got very few pictures, having just come from Martha's Vineyard, where we took several hundred beach and harbor photos. I'll be posting about that visit soon (and will try to use only half of the photos!).
Here are the words to the song (but go over to that link and listen!)
Sung by: Patti Page
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If you're fond of sand dunes and salty air If you like the taste of a lobster stew Winding roads that seem to beckon you If you spend an evening you'll want to stay If you spend an evening you'll want to stay Watching the moonlight on Cape Cod Bay |
We're on a roadtrip -- and finding unexpected places of interest is a highlight of our world. For more world views click on That's My World.
We visited Seamen's Bethel -- the Whaleman's Chapel described by Herman Melville in "Moby Dick." This visit -- which was completely unplanned -- turned out to be one of our favorite "tour" experiences.
This gentleman standing with Bill at the door of the Chapel was a big part of why we loved this tour. He is the Quaker pastor of the Interdemoninational Chapel and has a passion for the history of his Church and town -- and he was generous in sharing his knowledge. (He said that maintaining and sharing the Chapel's history is part of his job.)
We were really fortunate to meet him, because the Chapel is normally closed to the public on weekends (we were in town on a Sunday). As we arrived, he had just finished a Christening ceremony for some local people and he invited us to come in. It is always great to meet local people as we travel. Here's a little of what we told us.
New Bedford was a center of the booming whaling industry. The Chapel was built in 1830 by the New Bedford Port Society to promote the spiritual well-being of seamen (at least while they were in this port). It is still owned and maintained by the Society.
"In this same New Bethel there stands a Whaleman's Chapel, and few are the moody fishermen, shortly bound for the Indian Ocean or Pacific, who fail to make a Sunday visit to the spot." Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, 1851.
The second pew from the left above is the pew where Herman Melville sat whenever he visited this chapel. Back then, this was the front of the Chapel. There was a fire in 1867 (well after Melville's book was already a best-selling classic) and in repairing the damage, the pulpit was relocated and the pews turned around to face the West.
Melville's 1830 book became an immediate best seller. People began to travel to New Bedford to look for landmarks mentioned in the book.
When the church was reopened after the fire, the Port Society placed this replica of the bow of a whaler in the (new) front of the Chapel, to accommodate the interest of Moby Dick visitors (fans!).
The plaques lining the walls of the Chapel are called cenotaphs. They are visible memorials to those who lost their lives at sea.
The black-framed marble stones date from the times when Melville visited the Chapel up to tributes to men of the present-day New Bedford fishing fleet. (The later ones are generally lists of those who died at sea, rather than individual tributes.)
It is still a dangerous occupation.
Imagine Melville reading these memorials as he sat in the chapel, obviously thinkingabout how it would feel to read them just before you set out to sea yourself. Here is what he wrote in his classic:
"It needs scarcely to be told with what feelings, on the eve of a Nantucket voyage, I regard those marble tablets, and by the murky light of that darkened, doleful day read the fate of whalemen who had gone before me."
(Click to enlarge these pictues -- it is interesting and poignant to read these historical memories.)
The cenotaph below is the only one to commemorate women. These were the wife and daughter of a Captain who were lost at sea along with the entire crew of the ship.
Families of ship's officers often went along on these voyages, which could last for years.
Our guide told us that the women almost always kept diaries or journals.
He said they were very interesting to read because they detailed daily life on the whalers. (And he added that nothing is drier and more boring than the official Captain's logs.)
Women's diaries tell of babies who were born on board the ships and when they returned to land as toddlers, they were frightened of land and missed the rocking motion of the ship.
The Chapel was our favorite part of our visit to historical New Bedford, but there are many other sites of interest there.
The Whaling National Historical Park Visitor Center was a great starting point and the people there were helpful in pointing us in the right directions (including this Chapel).