Fried Clams in Menemsha then on to Cuttyhunk

When we weighed anchor in the morning, both the chain and anchor was clean, no mud, no sand, etc. They say the harbor has a hard bottom which presents problems for some anchors, they have a problem digging in to set. However with our 44lb Spade anchor and 60ft of 3/8” BBB chain, we were fine.

We motored out of the harbor and set sail to Menemsha on the western tip of Martha’s Vineyard. There’s a place to anchor next to the beach so you can dink into town. If you look closely at the photo, you can see our boat anchored out, it’s in the upper right corner.

There were two reasons for coming to Menemsha, one is for the fried clams at a shack that has received widespread, positive reviews from all over and the other reason is to buy fresh tuna. First we had the clams which were very good but not as good as Lenny’s, they were juicy but smaller. After a stop at the fish market for tuna, we dinked back to Fleetwing and headed out for Cuttyhunk. At least we sailed about half the way. We wanted to refuel before anchoring so we headed into the inner harbor but found the ferry parked on the fuel dock! An hour later, the ferry finally moved and we resupplied ourselves with diesel, gas for the outboard and water. The dock was rebuilt last year and actually looks modern now and is boat friendly.

We have come to prefer the outer harbor at Cuttyhunk vs picking up a mooring inside. Besides saving $40, it’s quieter and much less congested with more privacy. We anchor just north of the red flasher at the end of the breakwater in 9 ft of water. There is very little fetch anywhere from southeast to northwest. Don’t anchor here if the winds are out of the north or northeast. However, be sure your anchor is set well since the bottom has grass. So far tonight, we’ve sat through three thunderstorms with winds up to 30 kts with no problem. The boat behind us started dragging its anchor and the captain came forward to attempt to reset it with no luck. They finally fell back about ½ mile before getting it to set (in the pouring rain and 25 kt winds!) We downloaded the weather radar to look for a gap and made a run into shore with Hoolie between thunderstorms (hurry, hurry, Hoolie! Stop smelling and do something!) As I write this, yet another thunderstorm has hit but winds are only 22 kts at the moment and there’s no wave action since there’s no fetch. Thursday is predicted to be windy and rainy so we’ll probably stay put until Friday.