11.10.14

Winter sports are a not-so-secret pleasure of Island life in the season between late fall beachcombing and the thrilling arrival of snowdrops. All the more so because the appearance of ideal conditions cannot be predicted or promised. Only anticipated and prepared for.

By Nicole Grace Mercier

11.10.14

There’s a tendency to think that Island fishing ends after the derby’s final hurrah in mid-October. But wait a minute! They may be premature.

By Kib Bramhall

11.10.14

Dana Gaines's boat isn't a traditional one with a motor or even a sail. And yet he's taken it around the Island – twice.

By Ivy Ashe

11.10.14

While the leaves changed color, along the waterfront crews planned and fitted out for the annual voyages of vessels determined to follow summer.

By Matthew Stackpole

11.10.14

If the Amish played more tennis, I feel quite certain that this is the way they would go about winterizing their courts.

By Geoff Currier

10.10.14

Homeowners go solar on the Vineyard to save the planet and to save money. For Llewellyn Rogers, the priority was reducing his electric bill. In less than four months he saved more thna $1,000 on electricity costs.

By Olivia Hull

10.10.14

For two Island ferry captains, the end of paper nautical charts only makes them more precious – both as practical aids and works of art.

By Remy Tumin

10.02.14

I once had a friend who lived in an old farmhouse that had a five-foot blue racer snake living inside the walls. I asked him why he didn’t have it removed and he tersely replied: No mice.

By Geoff Currier

10.01.14

One of the most famous of all striped bass plugs, the Reverse Atom was born on the beach at North Truro on Cape Cod on a hot August afternoon in 1949.

By Kib Bramhall

10.01.14

“I bought it last year – it wasn’t [called] Chocolate Chip. It was some ungodly name that you can’t even pronounce that meant nothing to me at all. I have a forty-four-footer, and the name of that boat is Hot Chocolate.”

By Ivy Ashe

09.02.14

Ever wonder why fly fishermen wear dishpans around their waists? These contraptions are called stripping baskets, and the Vineyard was a testing and proving ground for them. A stripping basket is a container into which fly line is retrieved or “stripped.” It gives the angler the ability to control the loose line so that it doesn’t tangle with rocks or seaweed or other detritus or get rolled up in breaking waves.

By Kib Bramhall

09.02.14

Once upon a time it was standard wisdom that the hurricane of 1938 was the first and worst to hit the Island. But hidden in the bottom of coastal marshes, and in old logbooks and newspapers, is the true story of New England hurricanes.

By Tom Dunlop

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