August 17-19                   Nantucket, Massachusetts

On our earlier visit more than fifteen years ago to the Cape Cod area, bad weather had prevented us from taking a ferry to Nantucket.  We were eager to go there and had spent considerable time trying to get reservations at Nantucket Boat Basin, the premier yachting capital of the Northeast.  Our trip had been planned to take advantage of available slip rental.  Nantucket is a fourteen mile island that more than doubles in population size each day throughout the summer. The marina had 240 slips and reservations are often made a year in advance.

Nantucket Harbor was a huge field of moored boats with the famous red-hulled lightship signaling the entrance.  We received excellent directions and easily found our slip.  Again, David docked without incident though the slip was narrow and the dock help was inexperienced.  A small crowd gathered to watch as he backed into the dock without hitting any side posts and stopping just before the swim platform came into contact with the dock.  All those years of docking in our slip at Eagle Mountain obviously gave him skills needed to do similar docking procedures of our much larger boat.  Few things are more embarrassing than failing to dock properly in front of other mariners.

We were in a great location—one block from an excellent grocery story, a chancellery, and numerous shops and restaurants.  We were in downtown Nantucket with its famed gray-shingled buildings and cobblestoned streets.  Declared a National Historic Site more than thirty years ago, Nantucket is an historical treasure with a famous Whaling Museum and numerous pre-Revolutionary War houses and buildings.  We were delighted that several previous America’s Cup sailboats were docked near us.  Since this was Race Week, boats were racing each day in the harbor with big events scheduled for the weekend.

On Thursday, we took the island bus for a tour and were fortunate to have an excellent guide.  We learned that the permanent residents are very reluctant to allow change and are extremely careful to protect the fragile ecosystem of this small place.  Most vacant land is in a land bank owned by the town of Nantucket and little land is available for developers.  Real estate prices are among the highest in the country.  Homes and buildings must be built or restored to comply with strict regulations.  It is extremely expensive to bring an automobile onto the island and most people come by boat, ferry, or plane.  Summer residents include such notables as Ralph Lauren and Bill Gates (we saw neither).

Our friends, Ann and Glenn Biggs, had insisted we contact their friends, Susan and Bill Boardman, who live in Nantucket.  We did so and they graciously invited us to their home.  We accepted with the proviso that they would join us for dinner to celebrate our fifty-seventh wedding anniversary (a few days early).  Bill and Susan moved here more than twenty years ago and restored a large home that was reportedly in terrible condition.  Their gray-shingled house near downtown is three storied with a friendship or double stairway leading to the front door.  On both sides of the entry are double parlors, each having two fireplaces (they have a total of ten). The walls are covered with magnificent murals painted by a local artist who has since moved to New York and been featured in several design magazines. The house was built in the 1790’s by a cooper on a whaling boat so it had a plain interior without grand moldings or mantles; however, the original floors remain and were beautiful—wide planked wood with a high polish. Furnished in fine American antiques and unusual decorative pieces, these rooms and the rest of the house are like something from Architectural Digest magazine.

Bill is a corporate attorney who works mainly in New York and commutes home.  Susan is an accomplished needlework artisan who has future commissions for more than four years for her work.  She showed us exquisite quilts on their three four-poster beds and framed wall pieces that were intricate, beautiful, and cleverly designed examples of needlework.  Her studio is a comfortable, second story room, with great light, comfortable furnishings, and working equipment, that she inhabits five hours a day with her terrier, Sukey. Many of her pieces have Nantucket themes but she also does personalized designs for clients.  Her works incorporate embroidery, appliqué, and quilting in tiny designs that must require considerable skill and time to execute. 

We had dinner at a nearby restaurant, America’s Seasons, and enjoyed a wonderful meal.  David had octopus salad with pork cheeks (sounds gross but he declared it to be fabulous) and crispy fluke for an entrée.  He is already planning to replicate the latter.  After dinner, we stopped by the house and had Sukey join us for the short walk back to the boat.  Although it was after eleven, the streets and restaurants were still occupied.  The cool weather was a great incentive to stay outside.  Bill and Susan toured the boat and said all the nice things that made us happy.  We reluctantly said goodnight to two wonderful people that we hope to see again many times.

The Nantucket Whaling Museum is on the list of l000 Places You Must See Before You Die and we spent most of the afternoon exploring the exhibits, listening to lectures, and marveling at the wonderful collection of artifacts.  With a 47 foot skeleton of a whale (washed ashore in 1997) hanging overhead, the enormous size of these mammals is evident and the task of the whaler becomes even more daunting. 

I especially enjoyed the wonderful displays of scrimshaw and other items made from whalebone.  Shifts, intricate and complex mechanisms to wind yarn into balls, were made of small strips of whalebone by sailors as gifts for their girlfriends or female relatives.  Some of the ones on display were beautiful works of art.  I was delighted to find in the gift shop a book featuring the work of Susan Boardman.  It will be a wonderful reminder of a lovely evening in a charming place with two delightful people.