Lighthouses, memorials and dikes are following us around

Monday September 16, 2013
site 40 Fishermen’s Memorial Recreation Area
Narragansett Rhode Island

 

 

 

We fiddle the morning away while it rains.

 

 

The rain clears up although the skies do only partly.  Then David wants to use a $20 coupon he found on the edge of the campground map for two fish and chips, 2 clam cakes and 2 bowls of chowder at a local sea food joint.   So we head down the street  to Iggy’s for lunch.

 

 

 

 

Iggy’s is a sure nuff fish house but clam cakes are nothing like crab cakes which was what we were expecting.  Turns out they are more like hush puppies with a slight clam taste.  Everything is deep fried except the chowder which is good but has about ten times the potatoes to clams.  Iggy’s has won some local and state wide awards judging from the plaques on the wall but my opinion is none of these people have been to Massachusetts let alone Maine for seafood.  No smiling food pictures on this one.

 

 

 

We have better luck when we drive on to Point Judith. 

 

At the end of the road which dead ends at the point we find  U.S. Department of Homeland Security Coast Guard Station Point Judith and its LIGHTHOUSE.   It’s a working station so it’s surrounded by chain link fence with a security gate and lots of overhead wires.  Not the best of pictures.   Thinking that’s all there is we leave.

 

 

 

But we have even better luck when a short way from the station we discover a dirt road running off to our right to left.  At the end, we find a fishermen’s park complete with a memorial, a battery hill, a jetty and some left over WW II concrete somethings.

 

Concrete somethings with the lighthouse in the distance and a bunker hill to the left.

 

 

There are two really lovely spots here. 

 

One is atop the bunker hill where I found a great shot of the lighthouse but could not get these two people to move along. 

 

 

 

 

These next pictures are for Paul Dahl.  The first is taken from close up when we first were at the point.  The second  is zoomed from the here for another angle so maybe he can tell us what are these things carefully fenced in on the edge of the lighthouse compound.  I’m hoping you are going to say solar panels Paul.  :-)   There are a LOT of them going far off to the left out of the range of this shot.

 

 

 

From up on the hill we get a good view of the jetty. 

 

We have no plans to walk this one to the end.

 

 

Up close it looks really familiar.  :-)    With a SHORT walk out, it provides even better pictures of the Point Judith Light.

 

 

This is one of my favorite picture of the light house taken just at the foot of the memorial.  I know, enough all ready, but I do love lighthouses.  There is something very moving about them and the people who once took care of them.

 

 

The local community has created a very touching memorial to its fishermen.

 

The second beautiful spot and the most moving is the Fishermen’s Memorial built to honor local fishermen who have died at sea.

 

 

It’s a lovely spot over looking the sea.  The center granite stone has John Masefield’s perfect poem Sea Fever etched into it.  The wing stones list the names of all the men of this area who have died at sea.  Tokens of love have been left at the foot of each stone.

 

 

 

What a wonderful tribute from the community to these fishermen.

From the top of the center stone:
“Port Judith Fishermen’s Memorial
Dedicated to the Memory Of Those
Who Gave Their Lives To The Sea

It brought me to tears as I am sure it has many others.

 

 

 

On the way home we stop to take a look at the Rhode Island beach that draws people here in droves over the summer.

 

 

 

What we find is that going to the beach is expensive and the parking lot is bigger than the beach itself.  I could not get a picture of the entire lot without being up in a tower.  Hilarious!!

 

 

 

Ouch, $28 to come to the beach on a Saturday in season if you are from out of state! 
And even $14 if you are in state.

This is the time to come – no fees and no people.

 

 

 

BUT they do have a parking lined with ripe rose hips! 

 

 

Another fine sunset completes our day.