“Nantucket!  Take out your map and look at it.  See what a corner of the world it occupies; how it stands there, away off shore, more lonely than the Eddystone lighthouse.  Look at it – a mere hillock, and elbow of sand; all beach, without a background.”  Herman Melville’s Moby Dick

We recently returned from our 15 year anniversary trip to Nantucket, a small island (14 miles long by 5 miles wide) off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts.  Nantucket has been on my bucket list for years and I was so happy to finally get to go!

Getting to Nantucket proved to be the challenge of the trip.  We flew out from Denver to Boston on Friday night, a four hour flight, and arrived in Boston at midnight.  The next day, we took a Lyft from Boston to Hyannis, another 1.5 hour trip with traffic and then waited for the ferry from Hyannis to the island.  We didn’t arrive on the island until close to 5 p.m. on Saturday.  The weather was grey and dreary while we were there but I didn’t mind since it fit my idea of quintessential New England fall weather. 🙂 

Upon arrival, we walked to our AirBnB.  David booked a sweet little place in downtown Nantucket.  I am so glad we did that rather than something out on the beach since we could walk to all the restaurants and shops really easily.  Our house was a.do.ra.ble.  It was filled with antiques and so tastefully decorated.  It also had a second bedroom and bathroom (not pictured).  Sorry, lots of house pictures to follow.  

We dropped our stuff and headed straight to dinner.  We picked this place because it was described as casual and had a lot of history (1840s whaling bar with exposed brick, wooden beams, dark furniture, cozy!).  I had the chicken bahn mi sandwich; it was delicious!  

We then walked around town for just about an hour or so before heading home.  

The next day we took a Lyft to the Nantucket airport and rented a Jeep for the day.  The Nantucket airport was tiny but so cute.  The entire town reminded me of Jessica Fletcher and Cabot Cove. 🙂  Once we got our Jeep, our plan was to drive and explore the island.  Our first stop was Siasconset, a little beach community on the eastern part of the island.  We hoped to get good coffee and walk around the beach but it was cold and windy and most of the shops were closing for the season so it was mostly deserted.  So we stuck to just admiring views from the Jeep.

All of Sconset and the surrounding beach communities had gray shingled houses with white trim; classic Nantucket style!

After Sconset, we headed to get our beach permit and decreased the tire pressure on our Jeep so we could drive on the beach!  It was a really fun experience to drive on the sand and see some sights that are only accessible this way; we were also within a wildlife preserve so it felt very secluded.  We loved seeing a couple of lighthouses.

We then drove back into town and walked around the wharf, window-shopping and looking at the boats.

For dinner, we ate at the Nantucket Lobster Trap.  We had their lobster clambake.  So yummy!

The next day, the weather was the same:  grey, cold and rainy!  We headed back to some of the beach areas that we missed the day before.  We also went to the Whaling Museum in downtown Nantucket; it came highly recommended as the best sight on the island.  The $20 museum fee also gave us access to visit seven historic sites on the island, including the oldest working grain mill in the country, a Quaker meeting house, the oldest residence built in 1646 and a couple of other places.  We only had time for the museum, the old mill and the Quaker meeting house.  For lunch, we ate at a barbeque restaurant that was surprisingly good!  I wasn’t in the mood for barbeque so I opted for their clam chowdah.

It rained most of the afternoon but we did still manage to walk around in the rain and admire the downtown Nantucket architecture.  

The next day was the day we left so obviously the sun finally came out! 🙂  It was such a fun trip and I loved seeing all the green and growth for a change!  Special thanks to my hubby for making all my New England dreams come true and to my in-laws for taking care of our kids for a few days!