Park Unit 146: Cape Cod National Seashore

We left early this morning and drove all the way to the northernmost part of Cape Cod, to the Province Lands Visitor's Center. We first went down across the dunes to the beach for a beautiful morning view of the cape. The sand is lovely and more granular than in Westhampton or Fire Island. The dunes are also much larger - many were 20 feet or more and very rugged.

We were all so excited to be at the beach again so soon!

Bird tracks across the sand

We next went to the visitor's center building where they had a deck overlooking the dunes. One of the rangers excitedly gave us a pair of binoculars and pointed out the whales that were breaching along the shore. We watched them for a little while, then climbed the tower they have to an upper observation deck that gives a 360 degree view.

You can see by the photos that the weather was perfect! Cool, clear, and calm. We stopped into the store and bought some sweatshirts and got to chat with the rangers, who were very friendly. We also viewed some of the exhibits about the cape and the geography. We unfortunately left our paper with our park stamps on it at the visitor's center so we called them and they promised to mail them

 to us. 

Libby enjoyed touching the objects in the visitor's center displays

Next we drove about 40 minutes south to the southern Salt Pond Visitor's Center. We met Catherine's friend Hannah for the first time so it was a joyous occasion. Catherine and Hannah took Libby and went for a walk on the trails and I explored the museum at the Visitor's Center and watched the film. My one goal was to learn more about the physical geography of the cape and how it was formed and I got my wish! The film was old, but very informative about the geological process during the time when the glaciers receeded from the area. Excellent graphics and information. I got some gifts at the gift shop for Weston's birthday that we are celebrating tomorrow. 

We left about noon for our 8-hour drive home that went better than we expected. It was a terrific weekend and it felt so good to be able to travel again after two years of covid restrictions. We are excited to start planning more national park trips soon!