give me the north shore any day of the week

friday before the mlk-lengthened-weekend, i was chatting with my boss at work, telling him i had that day decided to take kel to the cape monday. i had heard the drive all the way to provincetown, at the tip, was only 3 hours so i figured we could do it in one day. being wise, he suggested we stay sunday night at a bed & breakfast and enjoy the better part of two days. i ran it by kel, and sunday around 2 we were off to 'the cape'.

as those in mass. know, it is not cape cod... just 'the cape'. a little snooty, i concur. i'll be all set if you call it cape cod, but i will admit it does make it easier to say. after writing that last sentence, i have no idea why 'the cape' would be easier than 'cape cod', especially with the latter's alliteration... maybe some part deep in me likes calling it 'the cape'.

tangent over, we left after kel's women's group on sunday, leaving bella in the loving hands of the cooks. we arrived at our b&b, brewster by the sea, around 4 and quickly found out we should have left q with the cooks and brought bella! the first words, before even inviting us in, when we walked up to the b&b were "oh... you have a child". excellent observation, host. now can we get inside and out of the 20 degree weather? in our defense, the website said "suitable for children", so we were not those people. she eventually introduced herself and showed us to our room. we quickly put our bags up and got out of there, getting a good but not great dinner in orleans (where again we were looked at as outcasts for bringing a child with us). here is our place, in which we had the upstairs rooms on the right front.

due to other comments by our host, we were afraid to let q cry himself to sleep (a note here: q cries 5-7 minutes tops, if that, before going to sleep). thus we stayed in the room with him and, to pass the story, stayed up until 11:30 with him. two results of that: 1) we found out that with our great sleeper, we don't know how to put him to sleep since he does it each night. 2) we had a suite with a fireplace in the 2nd room and were excited to snuggle up on the couch with a movie on and the fireplace going. suffice to say that didn't happen. eventually we all went to bed.

side note: the place was great otherwise. if you are a couple with no kids or can leave the kids at home, go here. just, as dave chappelle says, don't bring yo kids!

in the morning after a great breakfast and apologies from the owners, we left to go to provincetown. here is the sign, entering a place "like nowhere else" - the town slogan. fact from the tourism website: "Provincetown is America’s oldest art colony, the birthplace of American playwriting, and named “best gay resort town”". who knew american playwriting started here?!?

in the town center, they had what looked like a christmas tree made out of lobster cages. it looked pretty neat.

we drove out onto one of the piers and took a snapshot of the beachfront property at the center of town. it was very pretty. what look like beachfront houses are actually the back of the shops on commercial street.

also on the pier were various shacks. they were vacant, as was most of the cape in january, but the picture still looks neat!

the pic: some shops on commercial street. about 20% were open, but that was perfect for us because this also meant easy parking, zero crowds, and great deals. after lunch in a little cafe, we hit up a shop where we got 2 hoodies, 2 waffle shirts, 2 t-shirts, and a mug for $49. based on summer prices, this would have run us $150. a common flag was the rainbow flag with "peace" written across it seen here.

it was a little chilly in town but we were able to park right on commercial and it didn't stop q from walking around town. he stills wants fingers to walk, but he continues to love walking, either with someone or with his lawnmower. his jacket is a little short, too.

at the provincetown-truro line, there are some famous cottages right along the beach. they are ridiculously tiny, but people flock there each summer to be right on the beach. before getting the next picture of the cottages, i took one of the sun beginning its descent over the atlantic (obviously looking into the cape, not outward to england).

and the cottages... pretty neat. there were about 20-25 and each one holds two families.

before starting our drive home, we had to check out at least one lighthouse. we decided on highland light because it also had an observation deck overlooking a cliff and the ocean ~100 feet below. it was about 17 degrees and high up at the atlantic's edge, the wind was making it super cold. kel and q braved it for a photo before we ran back to the car. q was laughing the whole way back at mommy and daddy chirping about the cold during the run.

here is the lighthouse with the beautiful sunset behind it...

we changed q in the car because there was no way we were going to do it outside. as you can see, he is a great traveler and even after a day spent mostly in the car, he was still a happy camper. check out those two front teeth as well... what a big boy!

we drove back in 1 hour 45 minutes (3 hours.... pppssshaw: in the summer, maybe!) and picked up our puppy before heading home.

overall it was a good trip and we were glad we went. having now been to martha's vinyard, hyannis, and other parts of cape cod (albeit in the winter), i can firmly say i prefer the north shore. give me a trip to newburyport, gloucester, portsmouth nh, or our standard kittery-ogunquit-kennebunkport maine trip any day...