Travel Tales: Cape Cod, Massachusetts

My mother likes to tell a story about a concert she attended at the Wellfleet Beachcomber. After the show was over, she and her sister wandered onto the dunes of the National Seashore and saw the Aurora Borealis, rarely visible so far south. She later learned that she was pregnant with me, and while she regrettably elected not to name me “Aurora,” the Beachcomber, still Cape Cod’s only oceanfront restaurant and bar, has always been a favorite hangout of mine. During the winter, I check the Beachcomber webcam in anticipation of getting back to the Cape.

The Beachcomber is such a rarity because in 1961, President John F. Kennedy created, from the Cape’s ocean beaches, a national seashore. That law has allowed the Cape to retain much of its pristine charm; rules against building on the towering dunes mean that they’ve been mostly protected from erosion. The Beachcomber was a lifesaving station long before the rules were made, so it’s perfectly legal, even in its new incarnation as a restaurant. Frommer’s site describes the history of the National Seashore and present-day activities.

The Beachcomber’s position as a livesaving station was no accident: the sandbar directly in front of its spot on Cahoon Hollow Beach has long been a treacherous place for boats. In fact, in 1717, the notorious pirate ship, the Whydah, sunk off the very same coast. Almost 270 years later, during the famous Expedition Whydah, the ship was recovered.

The Whydah Museum in Provincetown shows off its numerous treasures. If you can’t get there, this ABC News video shows what it’s like to excavate the pirate ship, and uncover its treasures.

Provincetown is the real site of the Pilgrim’s first landing, but it’s got a lot more spunk than its counterpart, Plimoth Plantation. Provincetown has always been a hub of painters, writers, and other artists, and now that it’s one of the most popular GLBT vacation spots, it’s also teeming with burlesque shows. This video from Travelistic captures the many elements that make Provincetown so unique.

One of the best things about Cape Cod is the way it blends past and present: Henry David Thoreau’s book, Cape Cod, paints an equally accurate, if vastly different picture of the Cape than the video above. I’ve always found that time moves at a slower pace on the Cape, and I found proof in the e-text of Cape Cod by Henry David Thoreau. Thoreau writes in his account of a visit to Highland Light House that, “According to the light-house keeper, the Cape is wasting here on both sides, though most on the eastern. In some places it had lost many rods within the last year, and, ere long, the light-house must be moved.”

Thoreau wrote his account in 1856, but more than 100 years later, I was visiting the lighthouse in the town of Truro and donating money so it could be moved. It’s always been a favorite place of mine to visit, and if you read the full history of Highland Light you’ll see that in 1996, exactly 140 years after Thoreau’s book, the lighthouse was moved back and saved from erosion. I know it took the hard work of many people to achieve this feat. I wonder if there will be a similar movement to save the Beachcomber some day.