Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Pictures from Martha's Vineyard
We have been on Martha's Vineyard for the last couple of days, "up island" in Aquinnah, the town formerly known as Gay Head. The name was changed by a three-vote majority of the residents of the town in 1997, supposedly in honor of the local native heritage. Call me a cynic, but I'm guessing the widely understood evolution of the English language is the more likely sub silentio explanation.
Anyway, regular readers know that I'm a sucker for pictures of boats on the water. I took this one on Sunday afternoon, on the ferry from Wood's Hole to Oak Bluffs.
Here is the Gay Head lighthouse -- I caught the spinning mirror at just the right time:
We spent the afternoon on the beach. I went for a walk up toward the famous cliffs, of which more below, and encountered a man carefully balancing stones. Yes, he confirmed that he uses no system of fixation (and indeed took some small umbrage at my question).
This is a view of Nomans Land, an uninhabited and uninhabitable island off Martha's Vineyard. Why is it uninhabitable? There are many dangers. Suffice it to say that I would have loved to have seen our pilots bomb it to smithereens, which the explosion lovers in my extended family claim was really fun to watch.
Here are the famous colored cliffs. Note that I only discovered on my return home that this picture warrants close inspection, for it reveals a longstanding local custom.
And, finally, the "Sand Guitar" and its appropriately behaired artist:
4 Comments:
By 
Christopher Chambers, at
Tue Aug 14, 07:31:00 PM:
Gay Head? Well when are they going to find a new name for "Wood's Hole?"
By 
, at
Tue Aug 14, 09:15:00 PM:
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
By GreenmanTim, at
Wed Aug 15, 03:03:00 PM:
NoMans was taken by eminant domain during WWII. You will still find those small blue dots on navagation charts nearby that mark unexploded depth charges. Convoys from New York and Boston used to gather near NoMans before heading up to Halifax and the U-boats knew that. It may be one of the last refuges of the New England Cottontail that has all but been supplanted by the Eastern Cottontail. Frequent fire disturbance from bombing also maintained some early successional heathlands there that might have become more shrubby - and less biodiverse without it. I have done prescribed (controlled) burns at Camp Edwards on Cape Cod where we were instructed not to step off the cleared fire breaks because of unexploded ordinance. Made us really really carfeful about controlling the burn.
By , at
Wed Aug 15, 04:17:00 PM:
We were always taught that the human body is beautiful, especially at large pixel display!
Those other pictures are nice too.
