February 1989 was the first time back to the Vineyard in winter since I was a child.  Following are excerpts from my travel log about that trip and also pictures taken with a non-digital camera… which does have relevance in this post.    So come join me in a trip down a cold, snowy very wintery memory lane.

Picture of the Islander in dry dock from aboard the ferry, Eagle.

One of my favorite places is the Campground in Oak Bluffs.  I love the gingerbread cottages but most of all I really really love the Tabernacle… every time I’m on the Vineyard I take a few moments…or hour… and sit quietly there and enjoy just being.  Winter was no exception, cold as it was it was warm in my heart.

Let’s wander through Oak Bluffs a little …  notice Christmas tree is still in the Bandstand …

went out to South Beach where there were lots of Christmas trees people had brought after the holidays…    also drove out to Menemsha just to take a look around…

and then to Gay Head …

excerpt from travel journal :  ‘it was cold on the cliffs. 26 degrees maybe…but off I went to see them anyway.  Down the road I traipsed over the dunes and onto the beach… what a sight.  Thousands of rocks all shapes and sizes, and there in the distance… the cliffs… I was very excited.  Took some shots and scurried back to the warm car.  Noticed camera had opened a bit, closed it and didn’t think much about it.  After lunch in Edgartown I rode out the ‘bend in the road beach’ to take some pictures and noticed that the picture counter on the camera said #1 !!!!  When I had gotten in the car in the morning it had said #16 !!!  Something was wrong.   I turned around and headed for the camera shop.  Everything seems to be okay with the camera but maybe it got too cold and lost its memory and reverted to #1… or perhaps when the camera opened just that little bit it caused it to revert !!  At any rate I’m having what was in the camera developed.’

The following day I picked up my photos and not only were they all fine, there was this one…. actually, these two…

shot of the cliffs taken before camera opened …

shot after I closed the camera …  I’ve always kind of liked it… can’t do this with a digital camera …

After a long first day headed back to Edgartown for the night but not before stopping at Sengekontacket Pond for the sunset…

around and about Edgartown …

There was eating and relaxing but I also had a shopping mission !  My daughter Patty and her husband Mike were expecting their first baby and I, as soon to be grammy was determined to find an MV shirt for baby.  I had already promised myself, and future grandchild that I would keep her/him in Vineyard t-shirts forever 🙂  (They found out the following month that the baby was a little girl).

Not too many shops open that carried baby things… not too many souvenir shirts available either. Here it was only 3 months before baby would arrive and this was my only chance to bring back a shirt from the Vineyard.    On an off chance I walked into a store in Edgartown, I don’t even remember what they sold but tucked way off in a corner were… little people t-shirts.  I wondered just how little those sizes would be.

I hit pay dirt… there was one baby t-shirt and I grabbed it.  Ah, success and also the start of a still ongoing tradition.

Granddaughter Tiffany was the first to wear the shirt.. after her came grandson Tyler… when he outgrew it my daughter asked what she should do with it and I said I’d take it.   Here it is today being modeled by my doll Molly.

There certainly wasn’t as much snow that February as the Vineyard has gotten this year but I got to enjoy a powdery dusting of it.