Martha's Vineyard

We spent one of our vacation days on Martha's Vineyard, which was fantastic. We were able to score coupons for buy-one-get-one ferry tickets and left from the marina in Hyannis. The ferry was about an hour and some change and was a really beautiful ride. Claire liked it for the very short amount of time that she was awake. 

The first thing we did on the island was visit the Flying Horses Carousel. It's the oldest working carousel in the country, and incidentally, was Bearsy's first one! Brad and I rode with her on one of the bench-type seats (as opposed to one of the horses). We think she liked it. There weren't too many indications one way or another. Maybe she was confused...or maybe her ride on the ferry eclipsed her carousel ride. Who knows?

Look how happy they look while waiting in line!

And when it's my turn, there are too many distractions...

 Not sure what captured her attention here. There was a lot going on.

We spent some time walking around and looking at the sights and shops of Oak Bluffs (which is the town where our ferry docked and where we spent our day). We particularly enjoyed hanging out in Ocean Park. It was a GORGEOUS day, and the park is right on the water (hence, the name). It was beautiful.

The gazebo put me in a very Gilmore Girls mindset. 

We ate lunch a Linda Jean's, where I actually ordered fish (what??). It was fried and on a sandwich, but it counts, right? And, it was good. I got a side of sweet potato fries to go with it, and those were excellent. 

After lunch, we toured the Gingerbread Houses. That's what I really wanted to do. There are over 300 of these A.Dor.Able cottages surrounding the Oak Bluffs Tabernacle. In the 1800's, the Tabernacle was constructed to host Methodist camp meetings. Folks would come and set up temporary shelters for a few weeks of camp meetings. The meetings became extremely popular, and over time, these little cottages were constructed, to take the place of the temporary shelters. They look like gingerbread houses and were thusly named. Can you believe that my camera battery died at the carousel? I snapped all of these on my phone, but I hope you can see the extreme cuteness of the gingerbreads. 

After looking at about two-thirds of the gingerbreads, we found this little shop called Laughing Bear, so obviously, we needed a picture of our Bear with her shop.

We had a great day on Martha's Vineyard. We didn't do all of the available options (we didn't venture outside of Oak Bluffs), but we loved what we did. Claire was a good little Bear throughout the whole trip. Here's a little snap of her on the ferry back to Cape Cod:

We had a wonderful time on Cape Cod and Martha's Vineyard. It was a great, New England trip that meant a lot to us. Thank you, Gran and Grandpa, for the adventure! We love the memories.