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Columnists

Once and future salt marshes: A tutorial

Kim Gaffett

Fri, Sep 27

Category:

Ocean Views

Depending on where you start counting, our earth satellite has just finished its year’s travel around the sun; and now, we start a new year with autumn. Some or our favorite summer activities are enhanced and made sublime by fall weather. A walk in October light and cooler air is delightful...
Suncatcher Clouds

Martha Ball

Thu, Sep 26

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

T he glorious weather of summer has extended into the fall. The other night I heard raindrops on the south-facing windows about the width of a sleeping golden retriever away from the foot of my bed. It was the mild splatter of showers, not the battering of a deluge, but it still came as a surprise...
The Discovery Deck

J.V. Houlihan, Jr.

Thu, Sep 19

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

“This is one of those little museums that you walk into, and you can actually learn lots of great information in a very small space,” says contractor Mark Holden. I do lots of reading and writing at Seamen’s Institute on Bowen’s Wharf in Newport. It’s a hideout. I was recently setting up my laptop...
The Last Week of Summer

Martha Ball

Thu, Sep 19

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

Th ere stands a stone tower on Mansion Road. It was built with the Searles Mansion, for reasons that have varied with the teller, a sort of folly according to my aunt who was really some sort of cousin, or an entrance to the Poplar Cottage, as a favor or a payment for some right-of-way, or some...
Dish off the Block: Striped bass

By Pamela Gelsomini

Thu, Sep 19

Category:

Columnists

The stripers are running. I grew up in a fishing family where fresh bluefish and stripers were often on the menu. My father treated striper fishing as a science, determining what time of day they would feed, how the weather affected their habits, and what beaches they would be lingering at, waiting...
Order this... Delicious dishes at The Spring House

Amy Lockwood MacDougall

Thu, Sep 12

Category:

Columnists, Order This

September is one of the best months to come to Block Island. The days are warm and the nights are cool, the beaches are empty and the water is as close to perfect as it can be. The island is yours to hike and bike, and the restaurant at The Spring House is open to sate your appetite at the end of...
On Golden Pond

Martha Ball

Thu, Sep 12

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

La st week feels to have been very long ago, indeed. Thursday evening was windless, a beautifully golden end of day which found me on the edges of the New Harbor. The forecast was not good but there was none of that eerie calm before the storm feeling in the air; it was a perfect end-of-summer...
Dish off the Block: Wasabi tuna steaks

Pamela Gelsomini

Thu, Sep 5

Category:

Columnists

I n my former career (before becoming a full-time foodie), I travelled extensively in China, Vietnam, and Indonesia. I was, and continue to be, greatly inspired by the flavors and cultures of Southeast Asia. Tuna steak pairs beautifully with Asian flavors and this dish provides the perfect balance...
Foretaste of Winter

Martha Ball

Thu, Sep 5

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

We have had so many Labor Day weekends of hurricanes that never materialized in the wings, so many years of late August storm threats, some with floating docks pulled from the New Harbor in precaution, so many times of cars filling the Interstate parking lot in an attempt to get out before their...
Beach Flags

Martha Ball

Thu, Aug 29

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

It felt like an exceedingly long afternoon, stretching out forever, like the prospect of summer in late June. It is almost September and I know the sun is setting earlier each day but it felt as though time was almost standing still. It was, almost. The batteries in the clock on the living room...
Reservations

J. V. Houlihan, Jr.

Thu, Aug 22

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

In 2016 I wrote a column simply titled, “Standby.” I wrote the piece while I was out sailing, and was laughing like a loon as I punched the keys — I’m easily amused. I told my wife that I thought the column was funny in a Mark Twain sort of way. “Well, we’ll see when it runs,” she said. My wife is...
Celebration of Summer

Matha Ball

Thu, Aug 22

Category:

Island Notes

La st night the sky was dark before sunset, a dramatic band of gray blue that promised yet another storm that never quite materialized here. There were splatters on my windshield on the Neck Road, a flash of lightning as I swung round in my barnyard, some wet on a few west-facing windowsills, then...
Old Sailors

J.V. Houlihan, Jr.

Thu, Aug 15

Category:

The Ferry Dock Scribbler

“If you haven’t played the Garden, you haven’t played anywhere.” — Anonymous In 1968 while playing center for Providence College, Ray Johnson strode to the middle of the basketball court at Madison Square Garden. There, he stood face to face with a local New York City street player named Lew...
Dish off the Block: Grilled baby lamb chops

Pam Gelsomini

Thu, Aug 15

Category:

Columnists

Lamb — the other red meat! Mix up your grilling routine and try this super flavorful dish highlighting baby lamb chops with a twist on your classic pesto. The Chops: 2.5 to 3 pounds baby lamb chops, cut into single chops 6 large cloves of garlic, chopped 3 Tbsp. fresh rosemary leaves,...
Order this... Flavors from the sea at The Beachead

Amy Lockwood MacDougall

Thu, Aug 15

Category:

Columnists, Order This

Many visitors who come to Block Island have a routine when they arrive — some go to their houses to unpack, some go right to the beach, and nearly everyone I interviewed for this article heads directly to the Beachead as soon as they disembark from the ferry. It’s that kind of place — right on Corn...
Summer, still

Martha Ball

Thu, Aug 15

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

Fo ur years ago on this date I took a photo of the maple at the edge of the yard, noting the amount of sky I could see though its branches in mid-August when two months earlier it had been dense and lush. The rain that was never quite torrential here had ceased when I went out to compare this year'...
Summer Observed

Martha Ball

Thu, Aug 8

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

My R ebecca Rotary/Roundabout Report on Facebook began a few summers ago, a line from one of those lovely, overheard family conversations. Bits and pieces of summer observed from one little corner in town, the world passing by — and coming into — the Greenaway Gallery. There are movie matinee...
Disruption

Martha Ball

Thu, Aug 1

Category:

Island Notes

So metime over the weekend Verizon cell service went from increasingly spotty to dark. I remain hopeful, even as I write, that it will be restored shortly, certainly a memory by the time this column is printed. I have a landline, it is my fallback, my fail safe; it is the line to which my computer...
Summer Storm Tide

Martha Ball

Fri, Jul 26

Category:

Island Notes

There is a screen in my window. Not in all my windows, and the door remains open while I am home, but firmly in the one the that draws the most birds, regardless of the season. It is the window at which I hear a thump and sometimes see a bird lying on the ground beneath the glass, generally stunned...
A random inspection

J.V. Houlihan, Jr.

Fri, Jul 26

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

“Hello, sir. When was the last time you were boarded by the United States Coast Guard, sir?” asked the crewman aboard the 30-foot Defender Class vessel. “I was boarded in Point Judith about 30 years ago for a random inspection, sir,” I replied. “Thank you, sir. We’d like to come aboard to inspect...
The General Slocum

J.V. Houlihan, Jr.

Thu, Jul 18

Category:

The Ferry Dock Scribbler

The Hyannis home’s basement contained brass wheels, binnacles, brass lanterns with green and red glass, barometers, binoculars, a brass diving hard hat, various frayed charts of Vineyard Sound, Cape Cod, and Nantucket shoals, postcards of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard steamships, compasses of...
Mid-July

Martha Ball

Thu, Jul 18

Category:

Island Notes

There are banks of roses around the island, ramblers I have always called them, probably because my mother did, flowers in varying shades of pink that bloom after the multiflora has faded and fallen, long after the first, the most stunningly dramatic round of beach roses has passed. They spill over...
Grounded, redux

J.V. Houlihan, Jr.

Thu, Jul 11

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

“Only two sailors in my experience never ran aground. One never left port and the other was an atrocious liar.” — Don Bamford Running aground on any type of boat can be a humbling experience, and such an experience does, indeed, leave one grounded — complete ego deflation —...
Order this... Fresh take on favorite Food at Block Island Oyster Bar and Grill

Amy Lockwood MacDougall

Thu, Jul 11

Category:

Columnists, Order This

If you’ve been to Block Island in the past 35 years, you probably have heard of or been to or eaten at a place touched by Kimberly. Her newest endeavor with husband Norman Ward and Chef Terry Smith is the Block Island Oyster Bar & Grill, entering its second year down by Champlin’s. The Oyster...
Gift of the Morning

Martha Ball

Thu, Jul 11

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

Among the things that horrify some of my relatives is my open door (Autumn has to have free access to the outside while it is seasonable and I am home, a bird flying in every now and then is no big deal as long as it does not start building a nest, or panic) and no fixed screens (in the too many...
This land...

Martha Ball

Wed, Jul 3

Category:

Island Notes

We graduated from the stage of the Empire in June 1969. It was evening, we all wore “dignified” black caps and gowns, a United States Senator was our guest speaker. The country was at war, we knew it, but it seemed far removed from our lives. None of our classmates was going into the service, nor...
Tempus fugit

J.V. Houlihan Jr.

Thu, Jun 27

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

While rowing out to my sailboat a few weeks ago, I passed a 70-foot sailing yacht named tempus fugit — time flies in Latin. Leave it to the Romans to figure out such a precise phrase like that to give the good citizens of Rome something to think about while they were paying their taxes and...
A dark, short-lived fury

Martha Ball

Thu, Jun 27

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

On Saturday, we were not hit by the storm that dropped hail and pounding rain on the mainland. It was one of those times we were able to watch it, creeping across the northern sky in layers of dark clouds from which curtains of water hung, giving them a strange look of being land — or ocean —...
Order this... A feast of sights and flavors at The Atlantic Inn

Amy Lockwood MacDougall

Thu, Jun 27

Category:

Columnists, Order This

Perched high on a hill overlooking Old Harbor, the quiet pastoral setting of The Atlantic Inn offers a respite from the business of town, beach, and ferry. While there is no dress code per se , the elegance of the gardens, the inn, and surrounding grounds inspires you to put on a linen dress...
Falki at the Gate

Martha Ball

Thu, Jun 20

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

Th ere had been some grumbling in the Clay Head Swamp. The Pesky Pond Troll — the PPT — always lurking, had heard snippets of conversation he chose to ignore, all involving “his” Icelandic horse, Lukka, going north, not over the hill where he could visit, but across the wide ocean, to a place...
Sailing season is on!

J.V. Houlihan Jr.

Thu, Jun 13

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

Last October, I wrote a column about sailing and mentioned that my boat, Reverie, needed a new headsail — jib — because I wore the other one out from several years of constant use. The sail was patched, sail taped, careworn, and frayed; however, it had served Reverie well. I had...
In good hands with Jennifer Egan

J.V. Houlihan, Jr.

Thu, Jun 6

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

One of the greatest things about reading a good book is that we are able to learn something as we flip through the pages. A fringe benefit of reading is that we don’t need to travel, because good writing is like traveling. Whether we are reading fiction or non-fiction—if we get the sense that we...
Mansion Road Maples

Martha Ball

Thu, Jun 6

Category:

Columnists

T his is the time of year I think with each week the land has peaked. Early flowers and blossoms have come and gone, the beach roses blanket the dunes, and the maples, the weedy trees that grew while we were not watching, have become great green canopies, spreading over roads. When they are trimmed...
The Orchid Lounge reopens

Amy Lockwood MacDougall

Thu, Jun 6

Category:

Columnists

An old piece of Block Island history has been brought back to life. The Orchid Lounge, a popular bar in the 60s and 70s, in what was then the Royal Hotel, has been reopened at the Harborside Inn. How many times do you hear, “I remember Block Island when...” when speaking with islanders, or...
Turning the Tide column: Coastal seal rescues

Rosemary Connelli

Fri, May 31

Category:

Columnists

In a recent article from Hakai magazine, “Reassessing Seal Rescue,” questions and actions are spurred on the topic of seal rescues: Should the seal be rescued, handled by experts, or just left alone? The article shares a coastal perspective from the Netherlands, and the historical account of seal...
Rule of thumb for the summer: situational awareness

J.V. Houlihan, Jr.

Thu, May 30

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

The phone rang and a voice with a southern drawl said, “Hey, Joe, how’re you doin?” “Good, long time no hear Captain, how are you and yours? You still flying the big wagons?” I asked. “Yup, but I’ll tell ya, last week I crashed my Stinson Gullwing in New Mexico, some guy hit me while I was on final...
Eleven Blooms

Martha Ball

Thu, May 30

Category:

Columnists

Years ago I dug up what I thought were a few paper whites which had been blooming in a little circle in my yard. There was a mass of bulbs, I discovered, grown tightly against each other. I read instructions, separated them, counting as I went, collecting them in groups of ten, then hundreds. Some...
Miniature Yews

Martha Ball

Thu, May 23

Category:

Island Notes

A clitter-clatter follows me into the kitchen when I go to refill my coffee cup. I know it is Autumn. She does it all the time, and still makes me laugh, standing there, giving her empty dish — then me — a mournful look. Breakfast was served, I remind her, and she turns, dejected, only to plop down...
Memories of the bridges we’ve crossed

Martha Ball

Thu, May 16

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

S p ring is coming in spurts, as it is prone to do, but not at such extremes as this year. We always wait for the shad to bloom, watching it bud in the cool of April, often to flower and fade in a very few days of bright sun. It is the ornamentals that put the passage of time more certainly at our...
A Summer At Sea

Martha Ball

Thu, May 9

Category:

Island Notes

Th e first year I know there was an egret at the edge of the pond behind my house was 1990. It was May and I was out front playing with my new golden retriever puppy, my precious Shad. The fields were clear, and folks from up the road were out walking. They saw us and came up to see the puppy, or,...
The First of May

Martha Ball

Fri, May 3

Category:

Island Notes

It is the first of May and it is green and gray, the sky a parfait of pale blues and whites over a calm and near-silver ocean. The shad on Clay Head is still waiting for a day or two of full sunshine to burst open. The grass out back is thick but it is heavy with moisture, newly reclaimed, just a...
Class of 1969

J.V. Houlihan Jr.

Thu, May 2

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

“Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” — Samuel Beckett In 1969 I graduated from Saint Raphael Academy in my hometown of Pawtucket, Rhode Island — I was last in my class. The road to this ranking was rife with academic failure; school was not something I...
Dish off the Block: Thai Chicken and Shrimp Naan Pizza

Pam Gelsomini

Thu, Apr 25

Category:

Columnists

Sooo, I just won the Taste of America Challenge with my Thai-inspired pizza on naan bread! Naan is a soft Indian flatbread made with yogurt. A trendy ingredient, it can be readily found in most supermarkets. Naan bread is very versatile and creates the perfect canvas for a time-saving...
April Blue

Martha Ball

Thu, Apr 25

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

S ome years ago this paper asked about holiday traditions, be it Christmas or Easter, I do not remember, or it may well have been a theme through the seasons. I had little to offer, no recipes handed down over generations, carried from Europe in someone’s head or on a carefully folded slip of paper...
Cathedral of Spring

Martha Ball

Thu, Apr 18

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

A p ril came slowly, the daffodils at the turn off Mansion Road that some years bloom the first of the month opened a solid two weeks later this year. The forsythia, part of the yellow wave that belongs to this part of spring, has finally flowered, tossing splashes of color into the awakening, but...
Dish off the Block: That’s no yolk!

Pamela Gelsomini

Fri, Apr 12

Category:

Columnists

What’s for “brinner” — breakfast for dinner?” Never underestimate the power of placing a sunny-side up egg with a gooey yolk on top of some of your favorite dishes. These meals are taken to new heights when topped with the incredible edible egg… and that’s no yolk! Twice Baked Potatoes...
Stoked

J.V. Houlihan Jr.

Thu, Apr 11

Category:

The Ferry Dock Scribbler

The guy was swimming toward the rocky shore of the Point Judith Lighthouse as the whitewater pounded and rumbled him forward. The swell was pumping well over head and there were 40 surfers out jockeying for position in the crowded lineup. This swell popped up very quickly and the word spread fast...
Head for the Steeple

Martha Ball

Thu, Apr 11

Category:

Island Notes

Martha Ball is out sick this week. This column was originally published in April 2011. Y ou can’t go wrong when you head for the steeple. Sage advice, it was, from my cousin the mariner, he still so belonging to the world of deepwater he will not park close to the supermarket door. He...
A saloon musician gets his due

J.V. Houlihan Jr.

Thu, Apr 4

Category:

Columnists, The Ferry Dock Scribbler

”Bear down on that guitar, Houlihan,” said Jon Campbell from the stage as we were performing a benefit on Block Island for the moving of the Southeast Lighthouse. My response was a sneer at my music mate as I bashed down a solid G chord on my Guild guitar. That’s how Campbell rolled when we played...
Year To Year

Martha Ball

Thu, Apr 4

Category:

Columnists, Island Notes

It is April. All of the requisite calendar markers have been passed, the gas station is open on Sunday, the boat is making more runs, the grocery closes later, some restaurants are opening over weekends, others posting countdown notices until they will welcome diners. What happened to the winter I...

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Island Buzz

Still Looking for a Summer Rental?

Posted By

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3/28

Sullivan Sotheby’s International Realty has some great options, if your still searching for that perfect Summer Rental. We...
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Posted By

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3/28

***August 13,2020 House & Garden Tour: Southwest Point 10am to 3pm.On Hold until further notice*** All are welcome to...
2014 Subaru Forester

Posted By

- Private group -

3/27

Price: $11,995 Exterior: Green Year: 2014 Interior: Make: Subaru Trim/Package: AWD 2.5i Premium 4dr Wagon CVT Model:...
This weeks Nature Conservancy Schedule

Posted By

The Block Island Times

3/27

Check out this weeks Nature Conservancy Schedule at https://www.nature.org
Antique Maps and Vintage Photographs

Posted By

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3/27

The Block Island Historical Society has a great selection of antique maps; vintage photographs; unique posters & prints...
Highland Farm is officially OPEN for business!

Posted By

Highland Farm Inc.

3/27

Spring is officially here and we are ready to open for another great season here at Highland Farm. Our mulch is REAL BARK,...

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