Day 2

Started very early for me. I woke up at 5:30 and looked out to see that the tide was already pretty far out. I’d left my clothes in the front room, so I got up and got dressed and headed out. Today was not the lowest tide of the trip – that’s tomorrow – but still supposed to be quite low, so it was a good time to walk. It was foggy looking to the north, but not at the house, and the sky was broken clouds. I debated about my sunglasses but left them behind. I go on this walk every year – north from the house, past Hug Point (walking way out towards the ocean), past Arcadia Beach, to Jockey Cap and The Rock With a Hole in It. I had a brief scare when my camera wouldn’t turn on – what’s the point of walking all that way if you can’t take pictures? Fortunately the battery door had come slightly open and when I closed it things were fine. The sand is really high, as I mentioned in day 1, so things are actually not as interesting as they would be in a lower sand year. For example, the rock-that-looks-like-a-mushroom doesn’t really look like one, because the stalk part is mostly buried. And there are hardly any of the sand bar/pool areas that are so fun to play in. But with the tide way out there are some cool exposed rocks that you don’t usually get to see, so the walk was interesting.
The other thing that was interesting is that between Arcadia Beach and Jockey Cap there were many (5 or 6, but at 7 am that’s many) people out clamming. They pound on the sand with a stick, and then if they see what they are looking for (which I don’t know what that is) they jam a tube about 6 inches in diameter down into the sand, and then pull it up and look for clams. They try a couple of times, and then either get a clam or give up and move on to the next place. It leaves the beach looking like it has been attacked by some sort of giant sand mole.
The tide was out far enough that I could actually walk right up to Jockey Cap, which has some of the largest mussels and starfish on it I’ve ever seen. Probably because usually you can’t get to it. The Holey Rock beyond was in fine shape too, although rockier behind than I was expecting. As I approached those two huge rocks, the sun rose over the cliffs and lit the tops of them. It was really cool looking, especially with the fog all lit up behind them. And one seagull was sitting exactly where the sun would light it up when it spread its wings. Nice.
At this point I was thinking I’d made a real mistake in not wearing my sunglasses, since it’s about an hour walk back and the sun was now over the cliffs. But it turned out not to be a problem, because shortly after I turned around to walk back the clouds started to build up and the fog came in. By the time I got past Arcadia beach it started to rain. Fortunately I am a veteran of the 2009 MHA Howard Jones meet, and a little rain is no big deal. And I was wearing a rain coat. I even went past the house to go see the big rocks to the south, which I walked all the way around. I was a few minutes too late, so I got a little water over the tops of my shoes.
When I got back to the house it was 8:10, and Dave was up. I went back to bed and slept for an hour, and when I got up again Tim was also up. I had some cacklin’ for breakfast and read for a while. Meanwhile, Dave had gotten the password information from the rental folks and did some IT work to fix the wireless access point, so now we are able to get on the internet. Good thing he’s a wireless guru!
At 11 it was time to wake Josh up to get ready to go into town for lunch. He woke up fairly ungrumpily, and at 11:30 we headed in to town for our traditional First Lunch at Bill’s Tavern. In fact, our vacation is so full of traditions that there is barely time to get everything done. So we headed in, and there was lots of parking and lots of space at Bill’s. They have a sign that says, “if you’re in a hurry you don’t belong here”, but in recent years that hasn’t been the case – the service has been downright speedy. But this year, the service actually was quite relaxed. Not quite as relaxed as the service at Mo’s last night, but then our server wasn’t a magician either. Last night’s server made things appear out of thin air and made the boys’ lettuce squeak, which pretty much made up for the slow service.
Some of you may still be on tenterhooks wondering if Osborn’s is closed permanently, or if they were just closed because it was Sunday. Well, you’ll have to wait, because we still don’t know – we didn’t get that far north into town. After lunch we went to the mariner market for a few necessities (sunscreen, a toothbrush for me, sissy firestarters), then into midtown to check on beach bikes opening time, which since they were closed today we don’t know, and to look at the restaurant that has gone in where Gower Street Bistro was (not sure, sandwiches, breakfast stuff, may be good), and to make reservations for dinner at the Wayfarer.
Then it was time to go home. Josh drove home, and then after everyone got out I continued on. I want to walk south at one of the low tide days, but I can’t figure out how to get south of Arch Cape Creek. First I tried Shingle Mill Rd, but it ends still north of the creek. Then I drove south through the tunnel and found a road which more or less goes where I want, but it doesn’t have any public beach access. So I think I may need to just put on waterproof shoes and wade across the creek. There is a trail which goes over a bridge, but I think it is too far inland, and this is seriously the rainforest – where there aren’t trails, you can’t go.
When I got back to the house it was time for naps or facebooking or reading or watching TV or whatever. Dave napped on the deck, I napped in my favorite chair, and eventually Josh took my laptop out on the deck and sat in the sun communing with his people. When I woke up I spent a little time surfing the internet, trying to find a way across the creek. Then I went down to the beach to dig a hole. I made a nice dripstone castle. Tim and Dave came down and played catch for a while, then Tim worked on dripstone with me while Dave took a short walk. Then an amazing thing happened – Josh came down! He has not come down this early for years! He and Dave played catch for a while, the Dave went up and Josh and Tim played for a while. Tim’s throwing has gotten way better this year.
Eventually we all came up and got ready for Wayfarer. We had gone online and seen that they had completely redone their menu, removing all of our favorite things, particularly the stuffed mushroom appetizer and the 20 oz ribeye that Tim and I used to split. We are not sure, but we think that they may have gotten a new chef, because for the first time ever Wayfarer did not live up to expectations. As usual we ate way too much, and Tim had a fabulous spinach, bacon, and roasted corn salad, but the overall experience left something to be desired. But we had an exceptionally good time anyway, with lots of laughing and even singing. Also we developed the phrase “Bubby wouldn’t laugh”, meaning that in normal company people might think something was funny, but in the pantheon of funny, that wasn’t it. Even my joke about holding my ear to indicate that I needed to visit the restroom (ir al bano) didn’t measure up.
On the way home we listened to some favorite veggie tales tunes, concluding with a family sing-along to “The Pirates Who Don’t Do Anything”. Interestingly, we think that Tim is the only one who hasn’t been to Boston in the fall, but we are not completely sure. Then it was time for sunset, which had been looking very promising. I forgot to mention, although I’m not sure how I could have, that the weather today was completely fabulous. After lunch it completely cleared out, and although chilly it was just as clear and calm as we have ever seen. So we were really hoping for a green flash. Dave and I went out on the porch to wait and try to take pictures of the boys through the glass, but they kept hiding. Unfortunately the usual thick cloud layer was the re over the ocean, so the sun sank into clouds, and no green flash. It is still weird to see how far north the sun is setting.
After that Josh hooked the computer up to the stereo and played some favorite tunes (one donut a day, hamster dance, selected shorts from freecreditreport.com commercials). Tim and Dave played a game of canoe (Tim won handily) and I sat in my chair. Now we’re winding down from a truly great day at the coast – and the tide will be even lower tomorrow!

Wildlife addendum: The raccoon has now visited twice. The first time it was not scared off by Dave's yelling (although we were all quite startled) but fled when we got out the terrifying stuffed raccoon. It reappeared tonight and was not scared off by the terrifying stuffed raccoon, but was scared off by Dave's yelling. Tomorrow we may be held prisoner if neither of those things work. We have only seen one gull on th edeck railing so far, and it is clearly neither Gul Dukat nor Gul Darheel from last year, because when Tim threw a cherry for it there was a long time where it tried to work up the nerve to actually jump down onto the deck and get the cherry - either of last year's gulls would not have hesitated.