Winter sports aren’t my thing. You can have your boards and blades and your glacier-gripping cleats: My feet prefer to negotiate the ground on a pair of dependable soles. Because I grew up in New England, however, I’ve been conditioned to anticipate the bracing tribulations of winter. Maybe that’s why my favorite Greek myth is the tale of Persephone, whose yearly return to Hades compares favorably, in my book, with a ski vacation in Vermont. The one place I savor the season’s bleakness and bluster is by the sea. The ocean and sky are at their most alluringly fickle, in color and texture, temper and whim. And the wind smells of smoke and frost and hibernating salty grasses.
Last winter, when we were driven from our beloved Manhattan by real-estate realities, my partner, Dennis, and I moved with our two sons to Massachusetts, to a house within harpooning distance of the Atlantic Ocean. Clinging to a series of rockbound hills, Marblehead’s houses lean precariously against one another, hip to elbow, back to back, like a gathering of spinsters on their second decanter of sherry. The lure of this place may be maritime-quaint, but it does not share the sunny sweetness of Edgartown, the posturing of Newport, or the elitist sheen of Nantucket. Marblehead boasts more colonial houses than any other town in America, yet most are relatively modest, built as homes for cod fishermen, cordwainers, and blockmakers, not for masters of the seafaring universe. Many are painted in stormy shades of olive, violet, and slate. The place is cute, but cantankerous-cute.
Nothing stirs this town more than good old grange-hall patriotism; it is, after all, the birthplace of the American navy, the hometown of Elbridge Gerry, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and of General John Glover, whose Marblehead mariners ferried Washington’s thousands of troops across Long Island Sound in August 1776, and later, more famously, across the frozen Delaware River. Six hundred revolutionary soldiers lie beneath Old Burial Hill, the highest, proudest point in town. Marblehead wears its stories on its sleeve—or on its walls, lettered on countless plaques along the convoluted streets and public stairways. Stop to read one and, like a sociable ghost, some old-timer is likely to appear, offering juicier details about who lived where, what romance or betrayal or act of heroism took place under this low-raftered ceiling or down that dead-end lane.
At low tide, my sons, Alec and Oliver, love to lead the way down one such lane, where we cross Doliber Cove on foot to rough, wooded Crowninshield Island (natives call it Brown’s). There, the boys collect treasures: pungent crab claws, orphaned lobster buoys, curlicues of petrified rope. Flocks of eider ducks, resembling waterborne skunks, gather to feed in these waters through the winter. Sometimes they form a chorus line—dozens of ducks in a row, riding the swells like well-trained Rockettes. I’m counting on the right old-timer to pop out of nowhere one day and tell me what this choreography means.
In summer, you can cross Marblehead Harbor by skipping from deck to deck of the sailboats at anchor, but after New Year’s only a few hard-core trawlers remain. Nor’easters hit this harbor full force, and when they do, a favorite spectator sport is to head for the lookout point high on Fort Sewall to watch the breakers. One mother I know called me in the middle of a blizzard and said, quite cheerfully, “High tide’s at noon. Bring Oliver and meet us down at The Barnacle!” Crazy as it sounds, I struck out with my five-year-old, on foot, through a horizontal snowfall and drifts well over my knees.
Ah, The Barnacle: equal parts tourist magnet and local watering hole. Sometimes places that look too good to be true turn out to be, surprisingly, just that good. The Barnacle, off-season, is one of those places. It’s your archetypal clam shack basking like a seal on a precipitous rock, decked out in classic ahoy-matey style, walls hung with sailing doodads and photos of this tiny establishment prevailing against one perfect storm after another. Which is reassuring when you’re sitting at your table watching mammoth waves break at the roofline, frozen salt spray crocheted across the windows where your children are eagerly pressing their faces.
My ten-year-old, Alec, who aspires to be a restaurant critic, rates The Barnacle’s onion rings above those of any other nearby restaurant—and in the promised land of the fried clam, this is not trivial praise. Ditto, I’d say, for the fried oysters. His dad loves the mussels, served in honey-sweetened broth, and we’re all addicted to the Barnacle Seafood Platter (everything fried and lots of it). Other fish entrées are less successful—unless you’re nostalgic for Ritz-cracker stuffing. Service is languid, plump gulls perch on the empty deck (hoping a waitress will toss a few fries), and the faces of mansions across the harbor—on Marblehead Neck, a Hamptons-esque enclave complete with two yacht clubs—beam in the setting sun.
Up in Gloucester, winter brings out the belligerently battered look of the industrial waterfront and, in year-round residents, sports mania and a vinegared sense of humor. In Dogtown Book Shop (an avalanche of used and rare volumes) hangs a warning to parents that I, with boys in tow, deemed it wise to take at face value: “Unattended Children Will Be Given an Espresso and a Free Puppy.” In a nearby deli, the specials board announces in desperately bold capital letters, “will trade food for sox/pats tickets”!
Forget those preconceived notions of spotting doomed swordfishermen who look like George Clooney or strolling through artists’ colonies composed of twee little shacks. Gloucester and Rockport have other charms: wild surf-beaten beaches—better than a Winslow Homer retrospective—and, in Gloucester, a trove of funky thrift shops and a hidden cultural jewel, the Cape Ann Historical Museum. Its wide-ranging collection of fine art and artifacts includes several luminous seascapes by Fitz Henry Lane; a massive wooden boat that was sailed solo across the Atlantic a hundred years ago; an exhibit about the quarrying of the granite that defines Cape Ann; and—my favorite find—a hands-on sampling of the witty figurative textiles printed by the Folly Cove designers, a group of artisans, mostly women, who lived in Gloucester in the mid-20th century. A prominent member was Virginia Lee Burton, author and illustrator of the children’s classic Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel.
My ultimate destination is always Halibut Point State Park, at the northern extreme of Cape Ann, where I marvel at how many kinds of coast there are within so short a stretch. Some prehistoric glacial havoc is no doubt responsible for this anomaly, yet it’s hard to believe that this outcropping of cantilevered boulders is so close to the tranquil sandy beaches a short drive in either direction. In the middle of this promontory (where you can scramble happily for hours from rock to rock) is an old quarry, now filled with water. It was midafternoon when I visited recently, and my car was one of only three in the parking lot. As I took a long walk—around the quarry, along the operatic shoreline, down deep paths that snaked through long grasses—the low sun felt close and warm, and I felt as if I’d ventured all the way to Newfoundland or Skye.
My father dislikes shopping—he says that if he were king, he would forbid the sale of anything that’s already been sold too many times and of anything one “can’t live without.” This means that if Dad ever gets his scepter, much of Essex, Massachusetts, will be condemned to sink into the wide scenic marshes that embrace its scores of antiques, junk, and curio shops.
Several hulking establishments epitomize the no-such-thing-as-garbage emporium, jammed to the rafters with souvenir shot glasses, desiccated cellos, gum-ball machines, glass doorknobs, and Don Ho records. But there are many lovely, more selective places too, like Andrew Spindler Antiques, with its canny juxtapositions of folk art with Deco, Moby Dick nautical with Fifties Modern. Walker Creek Furniture is a Shakeresque melding of old and new seductively textured and colored cabinets, tables, and chests of drawers.
How Essex became a center of antiquing is murky. One story goes like this: At the height of the China trade, this is where the ships got built. With so much lumber to spare, people figured, why not make furniture too? Boards too short for the deck of a barquentine? How about a rolltop desk? And the homing vessels brought furniture from foreign shores as well. (The Essex Shipbuilding Museum is located midway down the gauntlet of shops on Main Street—a blessedly strategic location for those allergic to ormolu mirrors and porcelain pugs.)
I used to confuse Essex with neighboring Ipswich. Tucked in the lee of Cape Ann, the two towns share a flat coastline, lush yet forlorn, of rivers, salt marsh, and sand. In the winter wind, the dried grasses crackle like fire. Roads, deferring to the sinuous rivers that feed the marsh, tend to swerve and careen. Herons, cranes, and other birds flourish here—as do clams. So just as the shipbuilding industry turned this region into a mecca for people who can’t buy enough old things, the clamming business made it a mecca for people who can’t get enough batter-dipped bivalves.
Beach, seafood, antiques: In January, without the traffic and the lunch lines, you can easily do all three. People flock to the Clam Box, in Ipswich, but the most famous eating establishment in Essex is Woodman’s, a vast shed filled with picnic tables and the sizzle of several fryers. It has a state-fair atmosphere, which I love, but the seafood here may be too famous for its own good. Across the street, at Riverside, I was over the moon about my “panéed” oysters, broiled with spinach, prosciutto, and Pernod cream sauce and served at real tables, with cloth napkins and a lovely salt-marsh vista. In Ipswich, the most imaginative food is served at Stone Soup Café—a cozy, beloved pocket bistro. The cheerful waitress, having memorized a formidable list of dishes suiting every taste, turns out to be the menu. Our choices, all good, included mussels sautéed with roasted-tomato fumet and chorizo sausage, and a divine dish that combined halibut with lobster ravioli, grilled shrimp, and julienned vegetables.
It’s no secret that Crane Beach, in Ipswich, is one of the most beautiful beaches in the entire Northeast, yet few people take advantage of it in the colder months as the kite-flying, poetry-invoking, sanity-restoring haven it is. This four-mile stretch of fine white sand is just one flank of the 2,100-acre Crane Estate, which includes a wildlife refuge (a birder’s paradise), the 59-room Great House, and formal gardens.
The Inn at Castle Hill is a relatively new venture, but it feels as if it dates to the opulent heyday of the building that houses it, a shingle-style “cottage” that occupied this land when plumbing magnate Richard T. Crane Jr. bought it in 1910. The inn is now run by—and helps support—the Trustees of Reservations, the conservation group that maintains the entire estate as well as almost 24,000 acres across the state.
In the spirit of Brahmin restraint, there’s no TV, no radio, no bar-with-crooning-pianist, no raptor bellboy shadowing your every move. Tastefully refurbished—every perilous hint of Martha leavened with an astringent dose of John P. Marquand—the so-called cottage now comprises ten uniquely, pragmatically pretty guest rooms, a living room where tea and cocktails are served, and a simple dining room, where breakfast is offered. Out front, a deep veranda echoes the sweep of the marsh and beach below.
Late last winter, Dennis and I decided to splurge on a single night at the inn, reserving the one guest room with its own fireplace. (Others are larger or have grander views, but ours was fine enough, looking out over miles of ice-blue open water, the horizon frazzled by the wrinkly panes in the antique windows.)
That afternoon, we walked around the estate and ate a picnic lunch in the shelter of a tall rock on the beach. The wind blew so strongly that we could hardly hear each other talk, but the sun reflecting off the sand and rocks felt like a balm. Out on the veranda back at the inn, sitting on rockers, our knees tucked under afghans, we sipped Kir Royales and watched as two herons fished in the grass and the sky did that sneaky thing where it changes quietly from apricot to purple. Later, we walked out in the dark and groped along till our eyes adjusted. The moon was slight. By way of a deserted lane that circles the estate, we reached the seemingly endless grass allée that rolls from the Great House to a cliff above the ocean. We heard no cars, no motorboats, no crickets: just the measured murmur of breaking waves. Even in the dark we saw our breath. My teeth chattered as we returned to the inn, but how much pleasure would we get from building a fire if we hadn’t risked frostbite? That’s why you can’t be a true Yankee without winter: because all the best pleasures are earned—the fire, the fried oysters; the warmer seasons too. Who knows the real worth of summer at the beach without a good taste of the seaside in winter?