By Martha Hyams
In many ways, Wellfleet is a combination of the best qualities of the four towns from Eastham to Provincetown. It has the tranquility of Truro, the family appeal of Eastham, and the diversity and artistic quality of Provincetown. In addition, it has its own flavor and unusual attractions.
For instance, how long has it been since you’ve been to a drive-in movie? Come to Wellfleet, where the drive-in is still alive and active. On summer weekends the drive-in hosts a huge flea market that can have up to three hundred vendors. Items include vintage as well as new clothing, house wares, all sorts of crafts, Native American jewelry, antique furniture, tools, new handmade furniture, fruits, vegetables, flowers and all manner of collectibles
Colonists in the early 17th century found Wellfleet, then known as part of “Nosset”, to have the best fishing in the area. Consequently by 1650 it was a permanent settlement and rapidly became famous for its fish and especially oysters. The taste of Wellfleet oysters is difficult to describe, let’s just say they’re the best in the world, thanks to Wellfleet’s colder than average water, high salinity, fast moving tides, unusually clean water and rich nutrients. A celebration of the Wellfleet Oyster is held the weekend after Columbus Day every year.
Beaches abound in Wellfleet. Marconi is the only National Seashore beach. It boasts dunes like sand skyscrapers. Although surfing isn’t allowed on Marconi itself, nearby beaches attract surfers from all over the country who say they score waves that are more than decent. Be sure to visit the Marconi station also, where, on January 18, 1903 Guglielmo Marconi sent the first transatlantic wireless message. The message was from Theodore Roosevelt to King Edward VIII of England. It said, “Most cordial greetings and good wishes.” Still in Marconi, don’t miss the lookout platform, which offers a 360-degree view of the Atlantic Ocean and Cape Cod Bay. As if this weren’t enough, Marconi has a one-mile white cedar swamp walk winding through stunted pine and oak trees, leading to more mature trees and looping back to the beginning. The smell is wonderful.
Other ocean beaches include Newcomb Hollow, Cahoon Hollow and White Crest. These three require a steep climb down and worse, back up. If you can do the climb, however, it’s worth it. Cahoun Hollow also provides a fun restaurant and live music at night, beginning at around 10:00. Definitely for the young and hip. White Crest Beach has surf, which rivals that of Marconi.
Indian Neck and Mayo are bay beaches. Mayo has free parking. All of the other town beaches in Wellfleet require a resident, or temporary resident sticker. The sticker office is at the Town Pier.
For a change of pace, try the ponds in Wellfleet. There are three well-loved ponds: Great Pond, Long Pond and Gull Point. Our ponds were formed by glaciers centuries ago. Canoeing, swimming and kayaking are allowed on the ponds but pets, motorboats (or any engines), fishing, disturbing the animals or picking vegetation are forbidden.
Art is where you find it
There are some fabulous walks in Wellfleet. If you’re a high-energy walker, try Great Island. It’s an eight-mile loop, which forms Wellfleet Harbor. You’ll pass through small dunes, pitch pine and tidal flats all the way out to Jeremy Point. A much more modest walk is Goose Pond Trail at the Audubon Sanctuary. For two and a half miles you will see heath, salt marsh, and an oak/hickory forest. If you bring binoculars you will also be treated to several different varieties of birds.
For an otherworldly atmosphere, choose Billingsgate Island, or Shoal as it’s called now. (See sidebar). It’s off Jeremy Point; at low tide you will see the sand bars, which are all that’s left of the island, but you can walk out there.
The Wellfleet Audubon Sanctuary is on one thousand acres, holding five miles of hiking trails. In coordination with the general concern for conservation and our ecology, the Esther Underwood Johnson Nature Center uses solar heat, composting toilets and sullage or greywater for watering the gardens. Two seven hundred gallon aquariums show visitors the underwater environment of salt marsh and tidal flats. There are other natural history displays and informative murals in the Center. In front of the Nature Center is a butterfly garden. The plants in the garden have been chosen for nectar, nutritive powers and colors to attract butterflies. Provisions have been made for butterfly sunbathing, and for protection from night and rain.
Wellfleet has a charming business center that looks very much the same as it did fifty years ago. The town is best known for art. It has many beautiful galleries where you will find a variety of handmade pottery, jewelry, sculpture, paintings, stained glass, furniture, clothing and photography.
Stores are unique; there are no chain stores. The quality is generally very high and you will find an assortment of clothing, from Wellfleet T-shirts to Japanese kimonos, from trinkets to African sculpture, from fine handmade paper and stationery to postcards. The walk from one end of town to the other is not long, but it is very scenic. Travel down one of the side streets to see antique houses and lovely gardens.
Notice the First Congregational Church at 200 Main Street. Built in 1850, it’s known for its stained glass window, which has a picture of a ship of the Mayflower period; the Hook and Hastings organ, which is noted by the American Organ Historical Society; and the town clock, which keeps navy time on the church steeple. Marianne Nickerson, in Wellfleet Town Hall, says “I spent so much time on the beach as a kid with my fishing pole that I had to learn ship’s time so I could listen for the clock and know when it was time to go home.”
Often the most interesting history of a town is personal history. Irene Paine’s family goes back to the 1600s. Thomas Paine was a miller who built the windmill that is now on the Eastham Green. Fourteen generations later, Irene Paine now lives in Eastham. When her father graduated from college he was offered either an electric razor or forty acres in Wellfleet. He chose the forty acres. The family still owns twenty of those acres, the other twenty having been taken over by the National Seashore in the seventies. Like most native Cape dwellers Irene has mixed feelings about the National Seashore. “I’m sorry to have lost the land,” she says, “but I’m glad the National Seashore came in and protected us from having high-rise hotels and condos along the beaches and roadways. I can just imagine what it would be like by now.”
Along with the National Seashore, tourism grew rapidly in the sixties. Irene says, “I remember going to the beach early in the morning. When I came back late in the afternoon I could follow my own footprints back.” Although she was born and grew up here Irene didn’t eat an oyster until she was twenty years old. Now she’s a fan.
Irene has a diary belonging to her great great aunt who lived in Wellfleet and married and waited for a man who went to sea. Irene is writing a fictionalized account of their lives, called Eva and Henry.
Irene told me something many other people who live on the Outer Cape have told me. “If you grew up here you always feel like you have to come back,” she said, “I’ve lived many other places and I always come back.”