HOLLY NADLER
508-693-3880
Last week during a conjunction of the full moon, the fall equinox, and certain astrological forces at play (maybe Saturn was wobbling and Jupiter was tired of doing all the heavy lifting?), ninth-generation Vineyarder Gary Hathaway and his friend (and Island summer resident) Alaina Rastelli, both massage therapists in their mid-twenties, had an adventure that most of us can only dream of, unless we’re Henry David Thoreau.
Here’s what Gary and Alaina did: They walked clear around the shores of the Island. It took them four days.
They planned ahead insofar as they pre-buried tinned supplies of food and bottles of water. One of the provision drops was off Pohoganot Road, just shy of Oyster Pond. The other was at Squibnocket. (If this had been my plan, I would have been wandering around muttering, “Was it under this scrubby oak or that one?”)
On Thursday morning, the pair bummed a ride up to Chilmark and began their trek in a clockwise direction, that is, west to east, from the old brickworks beach. Gary reports that by the end of that first day, due to the uneven levels of the sand, his leg cramped up. Pain became a constant companion for the rest of the trip, but a continuous stream of delights and even moments of transformation made it all worthwhile. (Couldn’t some genius design a platform sneaker for the lower foot?)
When Gary and Alaina arrived at the mouth of Lake Tashmoo, the current looked daunting enough to give them second thoughts, but not so treacherous that to swim across meant certain death. They loaded their backpacks and bedrolls into a plastic kitty box, and swam from one beachhead to the other. The day had been beautiful, the wind at their backs, but as the light faded over their first glimpse of the church spires of Vineyard Haven, they realized a storm was sweeping down on them.
It was at this perfectly timed point that Gary recalled he lived in Vineyard Haven (he spends all his free waking moments in Oak Bluffs, generally in the company of his buddies Hawkins and Garrett of the trend-setting Jellyfish store). Gary and Alaina splashed through the puddles to Gary’s house on Cook street. “In the morning,” says Gary, “I woke up and realized I’d fallen asleep in wet clothes.”
The two loaded up on a big beachcomber’s breakfast in the Tisbury Marketplace, and then set out again. On this second day they hiked clear along the remainder of the northern shore, down around Eel Pond and the inner harbor of Edgartown where Gary trekked into town to honor a massage appointment made some time before. Finally they sauntered for several hours through the dark clear around to Job’s Neck on the far western side of Edgartown Great Pond. Good night, moon. Most of us would have been dead by then.
The most extraordinary segment of Gary and Alaina’s ramble occurred on their third day as they headed west along the south shore. They crossed miles of white, sandy, empty beaches, and surveyed long streams of coves, ponds, and saltwater inlets flowing to the ocean. (If you’ll look at the map, you’ll see that most of this stretch of the Vineyard is still a wilderness area; Henry David would have loved it.)
It was a day of alternating sunshine and cloud cover. Somewhere along the way four, then five, then finally eight seals, frolicked in the surf, staring at the pair of humans. The sleek seal entourage followed them for hours as Gary and Alaina tramped along the edge of the sea. Gary reflects now, “When you notice Nature, you’re already in a better place, but when Nature notices you, it bounces you to a higher realm.”
For both Alaina and Gary, their saga with the seals was the high point of the trip.
“Around Chilmark Pond,” says Gary, “the seals dispersed at the sight of other people. But later in the evening when we sacked out under the cliffs, a single seal showed up in the moonlit water and stared straight at us. It was a perfect end to the day.”
On the fourth and final day, the two hikers confronted their first real challenge at the western tip of Lobsterville Beach where Menemsha Pond opens, sometimes with tumult, to Menemsha Bight.
“The current looked mean; no way we could swim it,” notes Gary. They considered marching clear around the shore of the pond, then hitching a ride to the Dutcher Dock side of Menemsha. But what Gary calls Alaina’s “bubbly personality” saved the day: She convinced an elderly fisherman named Dan to ferry the pair across in his old Boston whaler. Finally the two made it back full circle to the beach on the site of the old brickworks.
“The spirits were really with us,” says Gary in retrospect. “Until Lobsterville, the winds were always at our backs, and the tides were in our favor wherever we needed to ford or swim across a body of water. I would advise anyone attempting this trip to check the tide charts first. This we didn’t do, but we were lucky it all worked out anyway.”
Gary says this adventure was his way of showing his love and devotion to the Island. Alaina wrote in a note before she took leave of us last Tuesday, “This full circle’s walk felt like my way of giving the Island a great big hug.”
There’s a lot doing in town this week. At the Oak Bluffs library on Wednesday, Oct. 10 at 10:30 a.m., preschoolers will be treated to stories about squirrels and spiders. At 3:15 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 11, 10 to 18-year-old kids and teens can enjoy Dance Dance Revolution. On Friday, Oct. 12 at 3:30 p.m., the six to 10-year-old story time will have a scarecrow theme. And don’t forget family games night at 6 p.m. on Friday.
Also on offer from the library: Would you like to learn more about a specific computer topic? Make an appointment to work one-on-one with an Oak Bluffs librarian and learn how to use e-mail, the Internet, the library’s online catalogue, or learn another computer skill of your choice. Call 508-693-9433.
Reunion bulletin: The Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School class of 1968 is planning their reunion for 2008 (I’m an English major — you do the math). To get on the list of contacts, send an e-mail to mvrhs1968@yahoo.com (wow — that’s so easy to remember, even people in this age group might not need to look it up again.)
On Monday, Oct. 8 from 2 to 6 p.m., Lattanzi’s Restaurant will be hosting a fundraiser for the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. A $25 donation will be requested, and in return you get pizza, pasta, and a salad buffet, a silent auction, raffle items and local entertainment. For more information, call the shelter at 508-627-8662.
Comments
Comment policy »