Provincetown

Our month on Cape Cod—day 28

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~Friday~ It was a post-celebration and drizzly day, and after a ride up to Provincetown, we mostly just chilled.

In P-town, we stopped at the Pilgrims First Landing Spot, and then drove slowly down the narrow main street, which is called Commercial Street.

[T]though many in this country know the story of the Mayflower, some might be confused about where the band of Pilgrims landed.

Many people would likely say that the Pilgrims landed at a spot to be known as Plymouth. True, the Pilgrims did land at Plymouth, dubbing it originally ‘New Plymouth,” since they departed from Plymouth, England.

But Plymouth was not the Pilgrims’ first landing spot in the New World.

Five weeks before coming ashore in Plymouth, the Pilgrims docked in at what is today Provincetown Harbor. In fact, the first written document alluding to government in the new colony, the Mayflower Compact, was signed by 41 Pilgrims while still aboard the ship in Provincetown Harbor.

Of course, with it being off season and the time of COVID, Commercial Street looked nothing like this, as it has when I’ve been there in the past. Happy times.


And there was no “Tea Dance” (gay people’s happy hour) at The Boatslip, where it’s usually “nuts to butts” with men:

Back at the house, we had a delicious vegetable soup that Vivian had made and brought, and Bob whipped up some delectable grilled cheese sandwiches to go with it.

Naps may have happened in the afternoon, followed by a light-alcohol happy hour, but with enough nibblies that we skipped dinner.

And since Jeff and Vivian are heading back in the morning, Vivian, Bob, and I only played Scrabble, forgoing a Catch Phrase game so Vivian and Jeff could get to bed early for their early-morning departure.

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Our month on Cape Cod—day 8

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~Saturday~ We made the short trip up to Provincetown today. Every person we saw there was wearing a mask. And leave it to P-town to be inclusive:
Heteronormative vs. gender fluid mandatory mask signs

Unequivocally, the thing I was most looking forward to in P-town was a stop at The Portuguese Bakery to get some malassadas, so you can imagine my disappointment at finding this:

John in front of the Provincetown Portuguese Bakery Closed for the season sign on the door of the Provincetown Portuguese Bakery

And as if to pour salt in the wound, a local walking by seeing us take this picture said, “And they’re actually closing for good. They’re not opening back up in 2021.”

I can’t find any article online to corroborate that, so I’m just going to pretend it’s not true until I see it (or read about it) with my own eyes.” Denial is not a river in Egypt.

(l) It’s so refreshing to see your humanity affirmed in a t-shirt slogan. (r) The Herring Cove tank top makes me laugh ’cause “girl” is not gonna let go of her bag no matter how high the water gets.

T-shirt store with t-shirt sayings on them that affirm gay people's humanity User's guide to Herring Cove tank top

Here’s Bob on the steps of the town hall recreating a picture he took there about 20 years ago.

Bob on the town hall front steps

We’ve been wondering about a couple of things since we arrived here a week ago. The first is about “heart art” on pallets we’ve seen all along the roads:

Red heart painted on a wooden pallet

It turns out they are to support and honor the healthcare workers working on the frontline of COVID, as described in this Painted hearts spread across south shore celebrate front-line workers Coronavirus crises article.

And the second thing is why the fire hydrants here have antennas on them:

A red fire hydrant with an antenna sticking up from it

According to a Reddit discussion, they’re for when the snow drifts get high enough to cover them—so the fire fighters can find them easily and so that snow plows don’t hit the ones that are on the sides of roads.

Although, one Reddit user posits that the real reason they’re there is “so dogs can listen to the radio while they do their business.”

By the way, the colors of fire hydrants are also significant, if you didn’t know. The red ones, like the one shown here, have the lowest flow volume at fewer than 500 gallons per minute.

“Back at the ranch,” we just chilled out the rest of the day, enjoying the leftovers of yesterday’s clam fritter meal for today’s lunch. I read some, and Bob watched some YouTube entertainment.

After dinner, we put together our menu for next week, which informed our grocery store list for Bob’s Monday Stop & Shop trip.

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