Wellfleet

We spent an afternoon in Wellfleet last weekend, enjoying the summer-like day -- after we decided that "no parking" sign could be ignored -- a snow storm seemed unlikely.

To us Wellfleet is the quintessential Cape Cod town. It has an active fishing harbor, near-by  is Great Island, a part of the National Seashore, a wonderful place to walk beside a dramatic shoreline.  In town are some of our favorite art galleries, especially the Left Bank which has so many wonderful painters and sculptors plus a room with smaller artisanal work, pottery, small decorative pieces, etc.  At the edge of town is a long wooden bridge over the marsh to Tim's Island, with a few houses and fir trees in the sandy soil.  For all of us this early May day was the first real taste of summer.  We ended it later with dinner at a restaurant overlooking the marsh where birds were busy not far from the large windows.  For a day we were being in our own area before the summer tourists arrive in just a few more weeks.

That Old House

This little house in Woods Hole, on Cape Cod was across the harbor from a portion of the Oceanographic Institute. The town was originally a whaling village. Many old houses from that era still exist there. This three story one with it steep pitched roof looked, on a gray misty day from a fair distance away, like a fairy tale house. I felt that if it were in a forest Hansel and Gretel might live there. I know absolutely nothing more about it but I was enchanted.

Animal Farm

After our exploration of the Edward Gorey house, we stopped not far away at a small Audubon nature area. The sun was trying to come out and we knew a short walk through a butterfly meadow [no butterflies yet] and a woods that came out at the animal shelters. These are "working animals"-- sheep and goats that are allowed to wander the lawns of the director's house [the area was a private estate that was willed to Audubon Society] where they maintain the lawn by grazing on the grass.

L. gave me a new camera for my upcoming birthday/mother's day just past but I had forgotten to bring it so she and I went back the next morning because I had fallen for Tom the turkey and was pretty well smitten with the haughty ram as well. White turkeys are handsome birds. This one was a true show off who puffed up to become a huge snowball with that incongruous red wattle and his tiny eye daring one to come near and touch him. The first time I visited this place I also saw some fat, happy pigs noisily rooting into a briar patch doing what pigs do while helping clear the land for a future organic garden which is now staked out and ready for roto-tilling.

Later in the summer this Audubon center will have weekend farmer's markets. Probably there will be goat cheese for sale but, I think, probably not fresh turkeys.