Island Girl Excursions

06/19/2025

Thank you US Coast Guard station Woods Hole for keeping everyone safe on the water. Capt Eamonn and the Bluebird passed the annual safety inspection with flying colors, of course!

06/06/2025

I would love to include this in the “Shark-Cuterie” that we are including in our custom Amity Island Jaws boat charter this summer. Please save 6 for me!

08/11/2024

The magic and beauty of Cuttyhunk Island are just unbeatable! Happy to get these hardworking summer hospital staff out on the boat to experience the Elizabeth Islands. And thank you to the primary guest for purchasing this charter to support Sail Martha’s Vineyard!

07/25/2024

Got these friends of SailMV out to the Elizabeth Islands and Cuttyhunk! We’re happy to donate a charter each year to such an impactful Vineyard organization. Thank you for supporting SailMV!

07/17/2024

The Edgartown Lighthouse under the spotlight!

05/05/2024

Look at that bow! The new boat has comfy bow seating, open air, and Carolina flair. Who’s ready for summer?

04/28/2024

We are beyond grateful to be featured in Travel + Leisure Magazine! Thank you to the Martha’s Vineyard Chamber of Commerce and Guinevere Cramer for connecting the writer with us!

The Massachusetts island is more than just the preppie paradise of yesterday. Here's how to explore the newer, more diverse Martha's Vineyard.

04/18/2024

Come get your car washed by the MVRHS Sailing Team on Sunday! We'll also have raffle tickets for some awesome items available. Please support this amazing program!

02/19/2024

It may be a quiet, still winter evening at Owen Park, but we’re getting ready for summer 2024!

11/17/2023

Becca Solway

William Ferdinand Macy was a New Bedford-born artist who, like fellow artist Wendell Macy, was a descendant of early Nantucket settler and original proprietor Thomas Macy.

Macy painted at least three large canvases of Sankaty Head along with soft-hued views of other familiar settings popular with the growing number of visitors and tourists who flocked to the island in the last decades of the nineteenth century. Macy’s 1895 rendition of Sankaty Head is one of his finest works, presenting the broad expanse of grazing lands that lead up to Sankaty Head lighthouse, built in 1849/50 to provide navigational aid to the busy stream of shipping plying the Atlantic passageway off the island’s eastern shore.

With the addition of the lighthouse, Sankaty Head became one of the most frequently visited and portrayed sites on the island. Herman Melville visited the island in July 1852 (after the publication of Moby-Dick) and toured the sublime spot, describing his impressions in a letter to Hawthorne: "The air is suppressedly charged with the sound of long lines of surf. There is no land over against this cliff short of Europe & the West Indies. . . .The sea has encroached also upon that part where their dwelling-house stands near the light-house . . . in strange & beautiful contrast, we have the innocence of the land placidly eyeing the malignity of the sea."

In Macy’s view, the bluff slopes gently down to the beach, where the ribs of a wrecked vessel sit near the mild surf. Sheep graze calmly on the grasslands and heath above, while in the distance sail and steamer traffic is visible, as are a cluster of sea birds hovering in the ocean air beneath a bank of tufted clouds. Several figures are barely noticeable on the extreme edge of the bluff near the lighthouse, walking along the bluff’s edge or perhaps picnicking, as was a popular practice in the later nineteenth century. The wide panoramic view is centered by the middle gathering of buildings made up of the keeper’s house and adjoining oil shed, and the massive red-and-white striped lighthouse, which stands nobly protective in the midst of the elemental scene.

08/12/2023

Thank you to the crew at SailMV for all their hard work this season. SailMV has been fostering the island's maritime heritage and teaching kids and adults to sail since 1992. Island Girl Excursions is proud to support this amazing Vineyard organization!

08/02/2023

Brilliant summer day exploring at Tarpaulin Cove yesterday!