Cape Cod Capers

08/05/2022

One definition of caper: an act of frivolous, playful behavior

Yep! That pretty much describes the 4 days in early July when the 3 House sisters invaded Cape Cod for the first time ever.

You might wonder just why we chose Cape Cod...well, actually, Cape Cod chose us. When we found out last spring that Maria's son Wyatt was going to be playing summer baseball for the Harwich Mariners, we decided it was a great chance to spend some quality sister time together and support our favorite college baseball player.

So we made the plans...booked flights to Boston from Indy and Gainesville, reserved a vehicle, and rented a charming "beach cottage" (or so we thought...more on that later). We would play around every day and watch Wyatt's games in the evenings. Great plan...except Wyatt, being the exceptional baseball player that he is, was selected as one of the best 26 USA college baseball players to be on Team USA in an international baseball tournament in the Netherlands. An incredible honor! And yes, you guessed it, his Team USA status superceded his baseball plans in Harwich so he never played a single game in Cape Cod.

But the sisters three decided to go anyway.

Barb and I met up in Indy and took the direct flight into Boston, where we met Maria who had flown in from Gainesville.

Let me just say the crowds and craziness at Boston was overwhelming! After cramming ourselves onto a shuttle bus overflowing with grumpy passengers (who didn't appreciate our midwestern fun attitudes) and standing in line at the car rental counter for a good chunk of an hour (Maria oh-so-graciously volunteered to chill and watch the luggage...and take photos of us fighting our way to the counter...that's me, in the hat, waiting with Barb just below the orange sign), we finally got our rental vehicle...

...and we were off, as Barb would say, like a herd of turtles. Apparently one of the main tunnel thoroughfares of Boston was shut down, so traffic was even nuttier than normal.

Thankfully Barb is an untimidated and confident driver, one of the great life skills she gained through her years driving an ambulance as an EMT.

Bye, bye big city Boston! We're heading to the storied, beautiful, peaceful surrounds of the Cape.

google image

Since I do love me a map, here is one that might help visualize locations.

We squealed with delight at this adorable little cottage...it was perfect for our stay!

But...the photos from the rental company led us to believe that it was near the beach and that we had access to beach chairs and a beach buggy. We had envisioned long morning walks strolling the beach with coffee in hand, and toes in the sand watching the sunset each evening. WRONG!

I'm not sure if it was our unrealistic expectations or misleading photographs, but our cottage was not on the beach. In fact, the next morning we walked around looking for which direction the ocean might even be. We did find some ancient, cobwebby beach chairs under the house (none of us were brave enough to even stick our heads inside the door) and the "beach buggy" turned out to be a rusty cart to haul our chairs to wherever the beach was. Uh...no. Just NO.

But the cottage was charming, with lots of original hardware and quaint touches.

We were starved after our stressful day of travel, so after settling in we headed into nearby Dennisport for dinner.

And to find the ocean. I mean, how hard can it be? It's a pretty big collection of water, surely we could find it...

We sorta thought we might've figured out where it was, but we were too tuckered to explore any more and saved that caper for the next morning.

We were enthralled by the gorgeous hydrangea bushes in full glorious bloom everywhere!

Driving through Dennisport, there were lots of cars at the Wee Packet Restaurant, so we decided that was a good sign (yes, isn't that a GREAT sign they have!) and had a fabulous breakfast there.

We never did figure out the significance of the name, but they sure did serve wonderful eats.

We struck out toward Chatham, Massachusetts in the farthest southeastern corner of the cape.

It was here that we first stuck our feet in the cool waters of the Atlantic.

I might add that one of the best things about Cape Cod was the fabulous weather! Temperatures in the 70s (unlike the 90s in Indiana) and low humidity...perfect!

Swimmers were very much discouraged, as there had been numerous shark sightings and even a few attacks already this summer.

Apparently there was a surplus of seals in the cape waters (although we never saw any) and great white sharks love to eat seals, or anything that looks remotely like a seal. Although I know seals are smooth and sleek and great swimmers (none of those adjectives describe any of us), we opted not to tempt a hungry shark with our blubber.

It really was a beautiful spot with very few people around.

Parking was free (we found that to be a rarity on Cape Cod) and beach access was easy.

The "la-ti-da" Chatham Beach and Tennis Club...

And more lovely hydrangeas...

From Chatham, we turned north to check out the Cape Cod National Seashore on the far eastern edge of the cape peninsula. We drove up to the point at Provincetown, then turned around and drove back down the narrow stretch of land.

We did not hike the trails down to the beach, but we saw lots of spouting whales from the Visitor's Center observation deck.

If you don't see the spouting whales, it's because I didn't have my big lens to capture the photos. But trust me, they were there and we saw them.

We continued down along the seashore to the Highland Lighthouse in Truro, Massachusetts.

And then, to end our day's tour, ice cream for supper.

We had new matching jammies which just so happened to coordinate perfectly with the deck. Since the morning light was so nice, we decided to do a pj photo shoot outside.

Actually, I think we all looked kinda cute and I'm going to submit a few photos to the pajama company...who knows, we may be their next cover models???!!! Or at least get a 10% coupon off for our next jammy set. Maybe?

Oh yes, we were laughing then...until we realized that we had locked ourselves out of the house!

And then we laughed even harder!

7:00 am on a Monday morning, locked outside in our pajamas! Our phones were all inside, so we couldn't even call the lady who rented us the house (I was taking the photos with my big camera and tripod). Somewhere we had read there was an extra key hidden, now where was that? We looked under and around everything, the nail where the key was supposed to be had nothing hanging on it.

Never fear, the House girls are resourceful!

We checked the narrow windows and thankfully one was not latched. So Maria wedged it open and managed to crawl inside.

Whew! I was thinking we might have to walk barefoot in our pajamas into Dennisport...not a pretty thought...

We spent the next 2 days doing much of the same, laughing our way through Cape Cod.

The beach situation there was very frustrating, though. $30 per day just to park!

We did risk getting towed to check one out...and see if we were missing anything...

The beaches were okay, but not nearly as nice as the North Carolina beaches were are used to. And there were lots of rock jetties that marked off "Private" beaches, so no long beach strolls allowed.

I love this photo of Maria...she so looks like our Mama!

We got a kick out of these signs and even Googled the expression. Apparently it is uniquely New England, meant to tell us that area is heavily populated. Although I'm not sure what their definition of "heavily populated" is, as most areas with these signs were just normal clusters of houses. Now to me "heavily populated" would be huge apartment complexes crammed to the gills with people. But then again, I am not a New Englander...nor will I ever be...

Cape Cod people love their floaties too. We saw oodles of these shops with every kind of floatie you can think of!

Ingenius how they used old net floats and buoys for decorations...

Woods Hole was a fun town and we were lucky to nab a parking spot on one of its very busy narrow streets.

Woods Hole is where people board ferries to Nantucket Island and Martha's Vineyard. We did not have the time nor funds to do either, but we did see the ferries. :)