Boston & Cape Cod May 2012

 This was our first visit to Anne in Boston, where she moved in 2011. 

We flew in to Boston and stayed in Revere, a close-in suburb of Boston itself.  The next morning, Anne picked us up and we drove to Cape Cod, where we spent a week with Anne.  On the way, we stopped in Plymouth, home of the famous Plymouth Rock, the traditional landing site of the Pilgrims in 1620.

The first reference to the rock occurred 121 (1741) years after the landing.   In 1774, the rock was split in half and the top half moved to the town’s meeting hall.  The bottom was left at the wharf.  In 1859, the columned monument was built and in 1880 the top half was moved back and rejoined to the bottom.  It was then that the year 1620 was chiseled into the rock.  Before 1880, several pieces of the rock were chipped off by souvenir hunters.  It is estimated that 2/3rds of the Rock’s top half were lost this way.  Of course, this important symbol is protected from further desecration today.  Did the Pilgrims land and take their first step onto the rock?  Probably not, but it does make a good story.

 

 

A replica of their ship, the Mayflower, bobs in the harbor.  The ship carried 102 passengers.  From the size of the replica, it must have been a very crowded passage to America.

After enjoying a delicious seafood lunch in Plymouth, we proceeded to the town of Hyannis on Cape Cod, staying at Cape Winds Resort.   The week with Anne was so pleasurable, as we explored the sites and had the opportunity to visit all week.

 

Provincetown is sited at the very tip of Cape Cod.  The town has been known for its artists colony and alternative lifestyle for at least a century.  The first steps of the Pilgrims in America were actually at Provincetown, but they decided that its location was not suitable for their settlement.  A stone monument marks the place where it is believed that they made landfall.  Thus, they crossed Cape Cod Bay and made that Rock at Plymouth the place we recall as being their first landing place.  They sure didn’t teach me this in my high school history.

 

Many of the homes are old and quite attractive.

 The sidewalks were packed with tourists (us included) enjoying the views of the homes and foliage.

 

 

Hiking the beach at Cape Cod National Seashore is a popular pastime.  The national seashore encompasses nearly all of the eastern part of the Cape.  The beaches are clean, sandy and go on for miles and miles.  Not surprisingly, President Kennedy created this park in 1961.

 

The Cape Cod Potato Chip Company was started in 1980 and offers a self-guided tour of the facility.  Their specialty is kettle cooked chips and they offer free samples in their gift shop.  A hour or so spent their was educational.  It is quite small, making only 350,000 bags a day.

 

We also explored Hyannisport, the well-remmbered summer home of the Kennedy families.  WE attended their church, spent time in the harbor, buit did not get to their compound, which is not accessible to the commoners like us.

Cape Cod Maritime Museum in Hyannisport holds artifacts from the “Sparrow  Hawk”, a pinnacle that was wrecked off of Cape Cod in 1626.  It is the earliest of colonial era wrecks.  A good portion of the hull has been salvaged and preserved.  The Sparrow Hawk had a full complement of colonists headed for Virginia.  Navigation was a hit or miss proposition in those days, with storms and winds potentially driving a ship hundreds of miles off course – which was the case for the Sparrow Hawk.  All survived the wreck and friendly Indians led a few of the survivors to Plymouth Colony, whereupon their governor sent out a ship to rescue them.  The ship was soon engulfed by the sands and mud of the Cape and laid there until another great storm uncovered her in 1863.

 

 

In 1914, Cape Cod Canal was completed.  Thus, the Cape is now Massachusetts’ largest island, although most people would not think of the Cape as an island.  The state’s largest natural island is Martha’s Vineyard island.  A large ferry connects the island to Wood’s Hole on the Cape. 

Once on the island, one can easily get around the island by bus – one day pass is available where you buy the ferry tickets on the Cape.  It was a warm sunny day and we enjoyed exploring a couple of the island’s main settlements.  The shores of New England are known for their treacherous, rocky shores and Martha’s Vineyard is no exception.  To make water travel safer, numerous lighthouses dot the shores.

Many of the homes testify to the wealth of many of the homeowners.

 

The island you see in the distance is Chappaquidick Island, it is connected to Martha’s Vineyard by a bridge/causeway which became infamous on July 18, 1969 when then Senator Ted Kennedy drove off the bridge resultinh in the death of his passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, thus ending his presidential prospects once and for all.

I had to chuckle at this advertisement on a sign on the island.  Wish we could have made it to see the “Electric Highway Experience”  but I had a full calendar on June 31^st.  Actually, I could not find the 31^st of June, as it does not exist.

A highlight of our time on the Cape was the day we spent with an high school classmate of mine, Mary Shooshan.  Mary picked us up early in the morning and drove us to the Heritage Museum and Gardens in Sandwich (on the Cape).    It includes museums of art, American history, and automobiles, as well as extensive gardens and grounds featuring a superb collection of Dexter rhododendrons (Mr. Dexter owned the land upon which the attraction is located) and azaleas.  We had hit the jackpot, as the flowers were in full bloom throughout its 67 acres of forested grounds.

 

An exhibit of classic cars can be visited.

 

A very educational museum of the works of the famous illustrator, Norman Rockwell, is on the grounds.  No pictures allowed of this for some reason.

 Another exhibit houses early New England treasures and a wooden carousel, that still runs.

Thanks Mary for the wonderful day.

Our week on the Cape ended and we returned to Boston for a few days.  One day we went to the JFK Presidential Library and Museum ( previous slutigrams document our visits to the Presidential museums of Lyndon Johnson, George H. W. Bush, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, Abraham Lincoln and Herbert Hoover).  The museum documents the public life of JFK, but little new was learned about the private life of him and his family.

Anne conducted us on a walking tour of the downtown parks of Boston, to include the Commons.  There is so much history on display in the monuments and buildings.

 

One statue caught my eye, that of Edward Everett (1794-1865), the famous orator.  It was he who was asked to make the main speech at the dedication of the Gettysburg Battlefield Cemetery in 1863.  He spoke for over 2 hours.  President Lincoln spoke for 2 minutes – his Gettysburg address.  Sometimes less is better.

By happy coincidence, our nephew Sven was graduating from Boston University while we were in town.  It was a good opportunity to see my brother James, his wife Gillian and their son Sven. 

 

 To end our trip, we spent 2 days in Connecticut visiting my brothers David and Paul and my cousin Patty Laforte. 

As Anne lives in Boston and likes it very much, I’m sure a return trip will take place.

 

 

 

Kearney’s Crane Migration

In mid-February through Mid-April every year, Kearney witnesses one of the more spectacular wildlife migrations on this planet, when over 600,000 lesser and greater Sandhill cranes descend upon the Platte River on their flight from southern USA and Mexico to the far north of Canada, Alaska and Siberia. Also, accompanying the Sandhill cranes are the 200 or so surviving Whooping cranes.

As the crane numbers increase each year, so do the people who come to view these magnificent birds. The cranes spend their day foraging in the nearby agricultural fields for tubers, grubs, rodents, small reptiles, earthworms, snails, amphibians and leftover corn from the fall harvest.

The National Audubon Society supplies the following information on Sandhill Cranes.
Cranes have been coming to what is now Nebraska for at least 9 million years, according to fossil records. The birds range from 3 to 4 feet in height, and weigh from 6 to 12 pounds, with a wingspan of 6 to 7 feet. Their lifespan is anywhere from 20 to 40 years. At night, they gather to sleep in 3 to 6 inches of water near the many sandbars of the Platte River, mainly along an 80 mile length of the river, centering near Kearney, Nebraska. As the water is often quite cold in February and March, they have the ability to constrict blood vessels in their webbed feet, which helps them to stay warm even in the icy cold waters. Cranes cannot roost in trees, due to the type of foot they have, and seek protection from predators by sleeping in the water. In flight, they normally fly at 25 to 35 mph, but with a good tail wind, have been clocked at 50 mph.

Our last hard frost was on my birthday (10 March), as compared to a normal last frost of 1 May, and the whole winter was much warmer than normal. This year, for the first time in known history, about 1,000 birds overwintered in Nebraska, rather than seek warmer climes in the south.

Besides the cranes, hundreds of thousands of snow geese and Ross’s geese add to the show. When they take flight, they almost obscure the sky. A Black Common Crane was sighted for the first time this spring. This crane is native to Asia, rather than North America. Must have made friends with some Sandhill cranes and joined their migration.

Each spring we look to the sky and see the vee of large flights of the cranes. Even at very high altitudes, one can hear their distinctive call. During the day, the flock spreads out a few miles on either bank of the Platte River. Just driving along, you will see hundreds or more at a time poking their beaks into the soil seeking nourishment. While in Nebraska, they put on a couple of pounds of fat reserves to carry them over the long flight ahead. At sunset, they rise from the fields and wing their way to the river, where they will spend the night.

This year, Elaine and I along with some good friends from Colorado, went to a viewing blind on the river in late afternoon to await the procession.





The Platte River is empty of birds when we arrive.




As the sun set, the cranes came in wave after wave, filling up every possible shallow spot of the river. We watched as they filled upriver spots. After a while, the cranes began landing right outside the blind. The sights and sounds were breathtaking.









I hope that this will get a few of you to come see the cranes (and us too) on their next visit. In late March, local communities host special events associated with the migration, known as Cranefest.