Close Ups
Text Box: Nantucket 1975 This chapter is the result of two weeks spent on Old North Wharf in Nantucket in May and June of 1975. We had already spent some time on Cape Cod but I wanted to see what Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard were like. What we concluded was that they really are very similar except for one basic fact. People in any one of the three places, for the most part, don’t know anything about the other two locations. It’s harder to get to the Vineyard or Nantucket and you’re arrival is really at the mercy of the weather, but they are all wonderful places to spend time. Gerry found us a rental in Nantucket for two weeks just before the season began. We were in a tiny cottage on Old North Wharf. This is a fantastic location. It’s on the water across from Steamboat Wharf so it’s right in the town of Nantucket, but it’s a private wharf so it’s not crowded when the day trippers are in town. There’s a group of shingled buildings that show up in every set of Nantucket pictures. Our cottage is just outside that picture and much smaller. There was a set of stairs that lowered on a rope to get to the “sleeping loft” upstairs. It was very small and the roof had just been shingled. The pointed ends of the shingle nails stuck out about a half an inch so that if you weren’t thinking and sat up quickly in bed you would be in great pain. There was a small fenced in deck that was over grass when the tide was out but over water when the tide was in . Amy was almost two, so we kept her in a tiny life jacket most of the time, just in case. She never even came close to going in the water but if she tripped and fell forward she would land on the life jacket padding. Since we had never been to Nantucket before I wanted to draw everything I saw. I’ve always really liked this drawing but, if I was doing it today there wouldn’t be as many shingles and the restaurant windows wouldn’t be blacked out. I recently took a look at a satellite photo of this area and I don’t think any of these buildings are still there. I was very happy with the ladder, the stake fence, and the sand but I made a mistake in the chimney on the right. I drew the roof line before I did the chimney and neglected to leave space for the chimney so there was a diagonal line across it. I remember deciding at the time that I could fix it later somehow. I just fixed it but much later, thirty three years later.

No life preserver, the tide must be out.

I like the hard-to-see staircase.

I know it doesn’t look like much but I like it better with the roof being behind the chimney where it belongs.

      Ladder                                                               Stake Fence       Sand

Steamboat Wharf from our deck.

Gerry and I remember this as much messier.

All material copyright 2016 Neil Borrell

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