I Suck At Provincetown

On the agenda today for Karen, my friend (Andrea), my BFF (Kerry), and I as we vacation in Onset for the week: Provincetown.

Now, I suck at Provincetown. I have never been to Provincetown. In fact, the only one of us who have been to Provincetown was Kerry. So by default, Kerry became our tour guide again.

According to my friend wikipedia:

"The area was originally settled by the Nauset tribe, who had a settlement known as Meeshawn. Provincetown was incorporated by English settlers in 1727 after harboring ships for more than a century. Bartholomew Gosnold named Cape Cod in Provincetown Harbor in 1602. In 1620, the Pilgrims signed the Mayflower Compact when they arrived at the harbor. They agreed to settle and build a self-governing community, and then came ashore in the West End. Though the Pilgrims chose to settle across the bay in Plymouth, Provincetown enjoyed an early reputation for its fishing grounds. The "Province Lands" were first formally recognized by the union of Plymouth colony and Massachusetts Bay colony in 1692, and its first municipal government was established in 1714."

I was surprised to find out that the Pilgrims actually landed in Provincetown. Who knew? The four of us just happened to discover that fact during our walk around the town. After all, in the day there really did not seem to be much to do in Provincetown except shop and walk around.

Truth be told, from everything that I had previously heard about Provincetown, I was expecting a lot of wild sights... much like what I imagine Mardi Gras would be like in New Orleans. (I have never been to New Orleans. I'd like to go someday.) Of course, the difference between my vivid imagination between the two would be that New Orleans would have half naked college girls whereas I pictured Provincetown to have half naked men in assless chaps... or cross dressing.

Sadly, I was a little disappointed to find out that my vivid imagination was just that... vivid. There were no bizarre sights during the day. Although near the end of the day, I did get to see a cross dresser with nylons and big hair... on a bike. So perhaps the weirdness only comes out at night. Oh well. As odd as this sounds, it was disappointing to not see things like men in assless chaps.

In my opinion, the best part about the trip to Provincetown was the "Breakwater". The Breakwater was constructed in 1911 to protect the harbor from the shifting sand of its dunes. Essentially, the Breakwater is a path of large rocks that stretches over a mile long. On the other side of the path is the outermost finger of the Cape and the Wood End lighthouse.

(The picture below is of Kerry, Karen, and Andrea trying to figure out where to go after crossing the Breakwater.)


Anyway, I had a blast crossing the Breakwater. Unfortunately, all the fun did lead to some casualties. Because the rocks were wet and uneven, Karen slipped and scraped up her shin. Likewise, I had a little accident. On our way back, there was a little girl coming from the other direction. Figuring that I'd let her easily by, I stepped off to rocks on the side. WHAM! That's when I slipped. I ended up scraping up my shin as well... and my hand... and the ring on my hand. It was a little comical because the little girl did ask if I was all right while I was getting up off the rock. Mental note: next time... push the little girl out of my way. Just kidding.

Interestingly enough, Kerry and Andrea were unscathed and they had sandals on. Karen and I both had sneakers. Despite the injuries, the Breakwater made the trip to Provincetown worth it. I had a great time crossing to the other side.

Following our trip to Provincetown, we went to Sundae School... twice. Our original plan was to catch the drive-in in Wellfleet, but with the inclement weather we decided that it was probably better to forgo that option. So Sundae School it was.

For anyone curious, Sundae School is an ice cream place. Part of our goal for the vacation week was to visit different ice cream locations every day. For today, it was Sundae School.

The Sundae School location that we went to following Provincetown was in East Orleans. Unfortunately, we did not stay long at that location. The East Orleans location, although probably very good, was not up to the standards of our tour guide, Kerry. We basically arrived to the location, got out of the car, walked back to the car, and left. It was that quick.

Apparently, Kerry... after hyping up Sundae School... did not want our opinion of Sundae School to be bad. So we ended up leaving the Sundae School in East Orleans to go to the Sundae School in Dennisport.

As it turns out, the Sundae School in Dennisport was definitely much nicer. I ended up getting a peanut butter sundae. (Cue Rachael Ray's "Yum-O" sound.) The sundae was very delicious. Kerry made a good choice. Needless to say, Sundae School was a good way to end the day. (Technically, we ended the day by going to CVS to purchase first aid equipment for our scrapes...) All in all, it was a fun day.