I'm finally done with school! It really seems unreal. I was getting so anxious about what I would do with all this time off- I haven't been able to pick up very many shifts at work and I am lacking funds for extravagant vacations. I suppose this is Vishnu's way of telling me to go on amazing biking adventures.
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| Provincetown 2007 |
Yesterday I convinced my good friend, Dunk, to bike with me from Boston to Plymouth on Marathon Monday. I've lived in Boston for six years and have gone out of my way not to see Plymouth rock; it was finally time. I was secretly making extravagant plans to try to bike all the way out to Provincetown, or P-town which is 125 miles away. I didn't quite make it.
Dunk was a little more realistic. He agreed only to accompany me if we would take the T to Braintree then take the commuter rail back. I grudgingly accepted.
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| JFK, Hyannis |
Besides living in Hyannis for four months, I hadn't really seen the south shore. It was beautiful. We tossed the route that I had mapped out and Dunk took me through back roads and along the ocean. There's something about seeing the ocean that is just so freeing, the smell always brings over a wave of nostalgia whether I am on the west coast, east coast, or watching hundreds of crabs scuttle along the shore of the Indian ocean, making the sand appear as a moving living entity.
After biking though Hingham, or (not so) fondly known as Chi-ching-em, we cut through Jerusalem street in Cohasset and as I came over the final hill, the ocean lay sprawling in front of me as blue as tanzanite and crashing against yellow rocks. I'm so sad I have no pictures. We biked on through Marshfield and Duxbury, or "Deluxe-bury", finally reached Plymouth, and collapsed on the ground.
Plymouth actually wasn't the first place that the pilgrims landed. They first landed in P-town, decided it was too gay for their taste, and moved onto Plymouth.
They tried to escape the king and all they found was queens, Dunk told me.
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| Plymouth Harbor 2011 |
When the Pilgrims landed in Plymouth in 1620 they first met the Wampanoags. The Wampanoags had been trading with Europeans since the 1500s. In the early 1600s, they had been depopulated by a series of epidemics. Massasoit, Squanto, and Hobomah extended a welcoming hand to the Pilgrims, who would not have survived the first year without aid. Soon more settlers came. In only five years, the Pilgrims requested more land from the Pemaquid tribe, whose leader signed a treaty to humor them. In 1630, Boston was founded. By the time Massasoit died in 1662, the Wampanoags were being pushed further back.
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| Peace pipe, Hyannis |
Metacom, son of Massasoit and dubbed "King Philip" by the settlers, began to form alliances with neighboring tribes in anticipation of more settlers to arrive. In 1675, Metacom with the Wampanoags and Narragansetts launched a war on the settlers. The settlers responded to the violence with violence, and as their battle technology far surpassed that of the Narragansett and Wampanoag, the American Indians suffered a great defeat. Metacom was killed and his head was displayed on a pike in Plymouth for twenty years.
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| Mayflower II |
I found out after I already got back to my home in mission hill that there were wigwams on display at the Plymouth Plantation as well as some information about the local native tribes.
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| the rock |
I got to see the Mayflower II and caught a glimpse of Plymouth rock. Dunk informed me that the real rock is out in the bay and the rock on display is just symbolic of the Pilgrims landing.
In the end, I was thankful to be taking the commuter rail back. My legs felt like butter. We gazed out the window, counting cranberry bogs until we fell asleep.
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| Cranberry bog in Hyannis |
References:
Brown D. Bury my heart at wounded knee: an Indian history of the American west. Henry Holt and Company, NY. copyright 1970.
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