Nantucket 2025 – Getting There

As you may know, Nantucket is my favorite cruise of the season. Our trips are always timed leading up to Father’s Day. My daughter lives in California, so I can never celebrate with her, but this is a great consolation.

We planned our departure for Tuesday morning. I wanted a large window for traversing the 25 miles of open ocean between Edgartown and Nantucket, so we all stayed on Amazing Grace in Onset.

Monday was a gloomy day and our plans to visit a new local restaurant faded when it started raining hard around 5:00. Tommy (Safe Harbor Onset Bay Assistant Dockmaster) told me Marc Anthony’s delivered directly to the bist and that was that – Movie Night!

The pizza was great and Marc Anthony has employees do delivery so the price was great and it arrived hot!

Tuesday morning brought fog, but no more rain.

As discussed here (ad nauseam), no one can predict fog, but some try. NOAA had it burning off around 10:00 AM. The wind forecasts were all nonexistent, so there was no reason to rush.

As always, my only issue was Woods Hole, and the image on the My Buzzards Bay New England Webcam page was not changing one bit!

The wind was still, but I wanted to get to Nantucket before noon, so we headed out at 9:30.

The visibility in the canal was about a mile, but the only thing on my mind was Woods Hole. If Woods Hole was near zero visibility, my plan was to hang out near Hadleys and wait for the high-speed ferry from New Bedford to Nantucket and follow him through the hole.

Mrs. Horne wasnt crazy about my plan, but she reluctantly agreed. I was also taking comfort in the fact that no one that had a choice was out on the water on this crappy Tuesday morning.

As is usually the case, our one mile visability shrank to 100’ as we got close to Woods Hole.

While I was focused on the radar and retracing my tracks through the hole from Sunday, Peter shot a photo.

I could see one buoy at a time. The fog was too thick to see the green day markers.

As expected, there were no other boats in the channel and I was quite happy when we cleared the final marker and steered east toward Poge Light.

By East Chop, we could see a 1/4 mile, but shortly after Poge, we went back to 100’. We only passed one private vessel on the way to Nantucket – The Camile. I hailed him on Channel 16 to notify him of my intention to pass on his port side. We passed with 1/4 mile between us, but I never saw him!

Right after we passed Camile, it cleared to several miles, but once we made the turn into Nantucket, it went back to a few hundred feet.

We were never at risk, but turning the helm over to the autopilot and manning the radar for two hours is mentally exhausting!

My heart swelled with emotion as we entered the inner harbor.

New Restaurant in Town

I was planning on having lunch at Charlie Noble, but it’s no longer in business.

I started searching for alternatives and stumbled upon the Easy Street Restaurant. There were only a few reviews online (just one on Yelp), no website, and no menus online. 

My curiosity was piqued. We headed straight over and discovered a great new restaurant.

I did a full review here, but here are a few highlights…

Hip, yet authentic Nantucket vibe.

Attentive and friendly staff.

Excellent food.

Opening a new restaurant in Nantucket can’t be easy. On the other hand, trying out that new restaurant is something we can easily do. So do it!

The weather was not improving.

We returned to Amazing Grace and transformed the salon into a media room. I was searching Netflix for a good movie when I noticed both Peter and Mrs. Horne had drifted off into dreamland.

Suddenly my eyes were heavy and I was snoozing too. Although the two hour run in the fog was uneventful, it was mentally exhausting.

On a clear day, you can scan the horizon and know nothing is happening on the water. In fog, you have to stare at the radar, analyze every blip, and if necessary, take evasive action.

After about a thirty-minute nap, I woke up and put on a Below Deck marathon.

B-ACK Yard BBQ

Given the rain, we picked the favorite restaurant that was closest to the Boat Basin – B-ACK Yard BBQ.

I was happy because they had Fiddlehead on tap!

I love B-ACK Yard BBQ because it reminds me of the Surfside Smokehouse in Plymouth. With that sweet thought in mind, I ordered the Burnt Ends.

I tried a piece and sadly, they were inedible and possessed no marbling whatsoever. It had the texture of an extremely well-done cheap steak and was dry as sawdust.

Interestingly enough, I called the runner over who delivered the dish, and before I could say a word she said “Not good!” Obviously, I was not the first person to report inedible Burnt Ends.

I quickly ordered Fried Chicken without taking the time to study the menu again.

I stole a piece of cornbread, sipped my IPA, and watched Peter and Mrs. Horne enjoy their dinner.

If I thought about it for a nanosecond, I would have ordered the Kielbasa sandwich – I’d had it before and it was very good.

But Mrs. Horne had shared a piece of her Fried Chicken with me in 2022 and I recalled it being unique and tasty.

It was, but I should have requested dark meat. It ended up being white meat and while tasty, it too was a little dry!

Oh well. The chef takes the blame for the Burnt Ends and I’ll own my misordering mistake!

Wednesday – The Big Boat Cleaning Day

Amazing Grace never managed to get a good cleaning in 2025. The hull and superstructure was cleaned and waxed in April, but our former maintenance mate was reassigned to teak restoration and never got a chance to clean. We are in Nantucket for a week and the weather is perfect, so it was a perfect time to do a proper cleaning.

Before I get to cleaning, I need to give you a little teak talk – ours was a major project. The first three detailers had really messed it up and I ended up bringing in a restoration specialist. He did a great job, but charged a small fortune, so we decided to “bring it in house.”

Bob did the two smaller decks, but not the lower cockpit, which is the largest and takes the greatest beating. While Peter and I contemplated our approach to tackling the project, Mrs. Horne literally shoved us aside and declared “I’ve got this.”

She did an excellent job ❤️

The stupid and painful part was that all she did was follow the instructions from Lais Bibbo (Maritimo’s detailer in Florida). Which was exactly what I asked the other guys to do. Oh well, thousands down the drain.

Back To The Big Clean

Don’t get me wrong, we haven’t been cruising around in a dirty boat for two months, but all we’ve been doing is spot cleaning – never a deep spring cleaning.

We started on the windows with the new DI machine (deionized water).

We also have the Unger System, but this is more convenient.

Meanwhile, Peter and I tackled the Lazarette, which had never been cleaned. Then Mrs. Horne did all the finishing touches.

I took a break to serve the crew my famous grilled hot dogs for lunch.

After lunch, Mrs. Horne showed off her teak chops by refinishing the Skydeck table.

I’m very happy my wife has acquired this vital life skill!

Next Up – Nantucket Part Two