Outer Cape Cod local ride
Fri August 3, 2018
(~238 miles)

There was a forecast for rain all day Saturday, and just a diminishing chance of a t-storm Friday afternoon. Friday morning seemed a good time to head down the Cape to beat the weekend rush and gather up the remaining lighthouses there for my IBA Lighthouse Tour. Temps were in the 80s when I set out around 10:00 but humidity felt down from previous days. I wore my mesh jacket this time, figuring any rain would feel good along the way it if did hit. I passed under a couple dark clouds along I-495 heading south and got a shower or two, but it passed quickly. There was maybe a half mile of backup over the Bourne Bridge, but pretty clear sailing from there on out, taking US-6 straight out to Eastham.

I’d visited Three Sisters Lighthouse several years ago, so knew right where to go to find the small park-like setting where the unusual triplet towers now reside, just east of their replacement. Click the link to read an interesting history, especially amusing to see how government waste and miscommunication was a problem even 150 years ago.

Just a hop, skip and jump away down the road is Nauset Lighthouse, which formerly served as one of the twin lighthouses at Chatham Light Station, and replaced the Three Sisters Lighthouse in 1923. This is the iconic “Cape Cod” lighthouse shown on the special license plates and a popular brand of potato chips, and it certainly makes a nice photo.

Getting back out to US-6, traffic was backing up due to the merge down to one lane that occurs near there. I spotted some local roads on the GPS screen to get around the mess and took them, but ended up waiting several minutes to merge back in further up the road.

Next up was a diversion through Wellfleet, a picturesque little town I enjoy visiting, especially for the annual fall oyster festival.

The former keeper’s quarters is all that remains of Mayo’s Beach Lighthouse, which apparently another example of government expenditures and reasoning going unchecked. The lighthouse was deemed all but unnecessary by local mariners before it was even built, and then was overbuilt for its limited useful purpose.

The tower was shipped across country and put into service in the San Francisco area when the station was decommissioned. There is apparently a ring of stones in the ground on the bay side of the keepers house, where the tower once stood.

I had passed a local seafood place on my way in and I had a real hankering for some fresh oysters, so I zig-zagged back through town to try out Mac’s Shack Seafood restaurant.

They have a nice shaded outdoor seating area with a raw bar right there, which seemed perfect for a lunch stop.

I found myself a good seat with a view of the bike and ordered up some shellfish and some poke salad (raw salmon, avocado, & seaweed on a bed of sticky rice), which I hadn’t had since our honeymoon in Hawaii. Everything was delicious and hit the spot on a tropical-feeling day like this. All I missed was some shave-ice.

After a good (if pricey!) meal, I headed out of Wellfleet back to US-6, turning off in Truro to get out to Cape Cod Lighthouse (a.k.a. Highland Light) on the eastern shoreline bluffs. I’d been here before too and seen it close up, so this time I just pulled up as close as vehicles are allowed to get my photo, avoiding a short hike down the right-of-way in my boots and gear.

Continuing north to Provincetown (or P-town as it’s locally known), I avoided the core downtown area to get more directly to the public boat ramp lot, where I hoped to have decent, if distant views of the two lighthouses out on the spit of land that forms the very tip of Cape Cod and encloses Provincetown Harbor on the south. I’m familiar with these waters from scuba diving and used to being a bit more close up to Long Point Lighthouse while in a boat.

The view of Wood End Lighthouse was somewhat similar. The only way to get closer is by boat or by several miles of hiking through the sand.

I knew Race Point Lighthouse would be inaccessible – it’s a two mile hike or drive down the beach to reach it, but I decided to take the roads up to the point anyway, on the off-chance there might be some distant view of it that I could use. Nothing doing, but I did enjoy cruising through the sand dune areas north of P-town with little traffic to speak of. The shaded tunnel of road back out to US-6 was a nice start to the couple hours journey south and west off the Cape and back home.