Posts in “Island”

It used to be a pretty normal island of 12 acres, with sheep grazing there, and then it somehow kept diminishing, and these days only a tiny part of it is visible at high tide. The rest is hidden underwater, and only appears when the tide is ebbing.

That August turned out great, with the sun and the heat teasing the hundred-degree mark. And so, one of those lazy August days we (Ben, Jeremy and I) took off under sail.

That day we were not supposed to be visiting Peddocks Island at all. Ben, Lena and I had a boat for two days of the July 4th weekend, and were planning an overnight cruise. The forecast for Friday was for north-east wind 10–15 knots, building up to 20 in the afternoon, with gusts up to 25 knots and 3–5 foot waves.

Nut Island is surrounded by Quincy Bay on one side and Hingham Bay on the other side, both being parts of Boston Harbor. It is one of those non-island islands, nowadays connected to the mainland.

Day 2. Middle Brewster Island

Day 1. Calf Island

The hot weather spell that set over our parts for the last week or two urgently required getting out, away from the city, into the ocean.

Deer Island is known as the Island of Huge White Eggs, the said eggs visible from many points in the harbor and beyond, and are even charted on the nautical chart---a very rare occurrence.

Every year, I put together a wall calendar with my photos to give to my friends as a gift. This year’s calendar is about Boston Harbor islands. What follows is a kind of preface to the calendar. (Don’t ask me how I got into writing prefaces to calendars!) Oh, and if you want a copy, let me know.

These days Castle Island is not an island anymore, just a part of Boston. In fact, it is no longer practical to get there by a boat. One reaches the island by car, by bus, and of course by bicycle. And so I went.

Outer Brewster belongs to the group of outer islands in Boston Harbor that sometimes are called just the Brewsters. One of them, Great Brewster Island, we explored the year before. Just like it, Outer Brewster is called by the name of its former owner William Brewster (ca. 1566–1644), the elder and spiritual leader of the Pilgrims, who came to the New World in 1620 on the Mayflower.

One day in September we were meandering around in Boston Harbor under sail. In the boat with me were my esteemed Father, who had just come over from Moscow to visit us, and was looking for new experiences, and Sergey, who had graciously agreed to help us with sail handling.

As I write more and more about the islands and lighthouses of Boston and beyond, it is inevitable that I'd mention one very colorful character: Edward Rowe Snow (1902–1982), Boston maritime historian, author, lecturer, activist and enthusiast.

Great Brewster Island sits in some eight nautical miles away from Boston, and belongs to the group of islands called the Boston Harbor outer islands. They take upon themselves the fury of the elements from the Atlantic. They shield the harbor with their bodies, so that the city could sleep well. Or, at least, better than if it were wide open to the ocean.

Rainsford Island was the first reachable-only-by-private-boat island that we have explored, two summers ago, and this is my report which I wrote down back then but never published before.

For a few years after I learned how to sail, I regarded sailing as a process to enjoy. When I went sailing, I, well, raised my sails and went sailing. That was the entire point now, wasn’t it?