Fun, Sun And History In Provincetown

Historic Town At Outermost End Of Cape Cod Draws Mixed Group Of Tourists

(CBS)  Bikers beware: If you, like many Americans, are overweight and out of shape, it can be easy to overdo it on the bike - particularly if it is a hot steamy day and you are unprepared for the various hills in town and on the Race Point Trail. Even as you gloat inwardly about being at the seashore on a stiflingly muggy weekend, you might, hypothetically, start to feel a little sick from all the exertion. Bring water, and don't be too proud to jump off your bike and walk it uphill.

Heat exhaustion aside, Race Point beach is gorgeous: Sand dunes lead down to a vista of blue water and sailboats. The water is stunningly cold, even in August, but refreshing.

Shops, Galleries, Restaurants, Gay Bars

Provincetown has the usual T-shirt and curio shops, as well as art galleries. Neither Jaime nor I was in much of a shopping, art mode for our Ptown weekend. We also passed on the many tours - $33 for a three-hour whale watching jaunt, sand dune expeditions, lobster junkets, sailing, etc. There's plenty to do.

I did enjoy one store, Marine Specialities Co., a kitschy Army-Navy supply store that sold French berets, pocket knifes, seashell sculptures, used American Airlines crockery, gas masks and $75 wedding dresses.

Dining was fair to good. On our first night we ate at Enzo's, an Italian restaurant in the $20-a-plate range. It was good, but I was miffed about our appetizer: roasted figs with gorgonzola cheese. For $13, we received two grape-sized figs cut in half. That comes to $3.25 a fig half. I always feel like someone in the kitchen is laughing when I get a microscopic appetizer. Saturday we ate at Bubala's On The Bay, where I had dry chicken breasts in pomegranate sauce and Jaime had tasty baked tofu. Our best dining was Sunday night at Lorraine's, a New York Times pick that featured good Mexican and American food.

Its long history of writers, playwrights and actors helps account for Provincetown's status as a gay mecca. The city's main Commercial Street can be roughly divided down the middle - gay to the west, straight to the east. Rainbow flags and bare-chested boys with dogs abound. Jaime and I saw a handful of gay demi-celebs on the street: butch comic and singer Lea Delaria; conservative columnist Andrew Sullivan, who said he was just in for the week; comedian Leslie Jordan, who played Karen's pint-sized nemesis on "Will And Grace"; and shirtless porn star Jeff Stryker exhorting passersby to attend his "cabaret show."

We asked Miss Richfield, a sassy drag queen in a nifty red Santa Claus miniskirt, what she liked about Ptown.

"CBS News, huh? And they couldn't give you a better camera than that?" she quipped before reflecting on the allure of Ptown's main Commercial Street.

"It's the only place on earth where everyone funnels into one place. The gays, the straights, the handsome, the not-so …" she said. "I've been to a lot of places, Fort Lauderdale, Key West, it's the only place like that."

My Favorite Things; And "A Spit Of Sand"

One of my many favorite things on this first trek to Ptown was to marvel at the array of flowers. Enormous sunflowers everywhere; huge hibiscus; petunias and poppies; flowers in manicured window boxes or growing loose and wild in front yards.

After looking at a placard of Cape Cod wildlife, Jaime and I designated a mascot for our trip: the semipalmated sandpiper. "That's a hell of a name for that little bird,'' said Jaime.

At night the buskers come out on Commercial Street, and it's a mixed bag. We passed an opera singer regaling passersby and a pair of folk singers from Montreal. A muscled young man strummed his guitar and sang "American Pie." An old man played serene New Age music on an electric piano, prompting a catty comment from a passerby: "Did I just die?"

After dinner one night, Jaime and I enjoyed bolas de berlim, custard-filled donuts from The Portuguese Bakery. Ptown became home to a community of Portuguese who worked in the fleets.

Returning to the bike, it was just very pleasant to go in and out of the side streets, marveling at this view or that. The August air at night is perfect for just a T-shirt - cool but not too cool.

On the far west end of Commercial Street, I spoke with a homeowner working in his front yard. I was curious what it was like to actually live in Provincetown. He said not that many people actually do; the majority come for the summer and leave their houses empty for the winter.

"It's a different place than it used to be. Not that many people are living here full time,'' said Joe Connolly, a courtroom illustrator from Boston. Connolly has lived in Ptown for 30 years, and his Cape Cod home dates back to 1790 (it says so on a plaque). He declined to guess what his house was worth, but said the two-story house next door had just sold for $1.4 million.

Connolly had his own idea of what makes Provincetown popular.

"It's something psychological about its location on a spit of sand. People like to go to the farthest, outermost point because it's there. If you go to a mountain, you want to go to the top."

And, he added, people like the town's easy, anything-goes attitude.

"Provincetown has a tradition of being beyond the pale."

[ptownlive]

This is a nice piece on Provincetown. Just wanted to comment that there is another directory devoted solely to Provincetown Businesses, Artists, Performers and other retailers. It''s called provincetownlive.net, a MySpace for local businesses. But going beyond the web directory trend, provincetownlive.net can also be accessed through the mobile web at http://ptownlive.net.

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