Page 60 - The Hunt - Summer 2021

TRAVELER
58 THE HUNT MAGAZINE
summer 2021
Opposite page: the cliffs of Gay Head. This page: Edgartown’s harbor and the Mytoi Japanese Garden (below).
You can fly there. But if you have a choice, take the ferry from Woods Hole. The drive south toward this jumping-off point to the island of Martha’s Vineyard leads through the western part of Cape Cod from Bourne and past Falmouth, providing the visitor a view of graying wood shingles on classic saltbox houses, lichen-covered stone fences, and groves of wind-beaten oak trees—the charming but hardscrabble essence of rural New England.
On busy summer days, Woods Hole’s small fleet of large ferries carry hundreds of cars and transport vehicles back and forth, along with legions of walk-on passengers. The waterfront’s battered fishing boats, wooden lobster traps and piles of netting set out to dry are a testament to the region’s seafaring heritage. Once everyone has boarded, the ferry chugs out of its slip, past the largely uninhabited Elizabeth Islands just to the right and begins the 45-minute voyage to Vineyard Haven on West Chop (officially known as Tisbury) or, on occasion, a little longer to Oak Bluffs on East Chop.
The Vineyard is the larger and shoreward of the two big islands off the Massachusetts coast south of Boston, the other being the smaller and farther-out Nantucket. The two are not very much alike, even though they share a whaling heritage. At about 26 miles at its longest and nine miles at its widest, the Vineyard is the larger of the two. It’s also more casual and more rural, with stretches of farmland between its half-dozen towns.
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