A Nantucket Interlude

Over the Labor Day long weekend Boy and I decamped to Nantucket for a leisurely end-of-summer getaway.  That meant not only a vacation from the workaday world for Reggie, but also a respite from his regular blogging, Dear Reader.  I purposely didn't take my laptop with me on our Nantucket sojourn.

It was really rather liberating not to be hooked into the blogosphere during our visit to the island.  But it was also rather maddening, as I can't remember the last time I've gone a full five days without having the opportunity to tap away at my computer, doing this and that.

The entrance to the Cliffside's clubhouse

We stayed at the Cliffside Beach Club & Hotel, an intimate private club and hotel right on the beach, about a mile outside of the town of Nantucket.

We didn't rent a house on the island this year because I procrastinated doing so until long after the last berth was booked on the car ferries to and from the island during the month of August.  No berth = no car on island = an impossibility when one rents a house out of town, as we have done in years past.  Believe me, that is not going to happen again next year!

The Cliffside Beach Club in the 1930s
Image courtesy of Vintage Photo Works

We more than consoled ourselves this season, however, with a visit to the Cliffside Beach Club & Hotel.  The Cliffside has been around for a long time, more than one hundred years.  I'm not sure when they added hotel rooms to it, but I'm glad they did.  There are only twenty-seven guest rooms at the hotel, and it retains an intimacy that is most appealing.

An aerial view of the Cliffside Beach Club & Hotel today
Image courtesy of same

The Cliffside has a wonderfully old-fashioned look.  Very beachy.  Very New England.  Very Nantucket.  We loved it.

The view out to sea from the club's entrance

While the Cliffside is considered to be a luxury boutique hotel, one doesn't go there expecting a Ritz-Carlton, full-dawg resort experience.  There are no pool boys running around spritzing guests with Evian filled atomizers as they loll on chaise longues.  It's very low key—one spritzes oneself.

The covered loggia at the Cliffside,
perfect for admiring the ocean view

I'd say that the level of service at the Cliffside is up to any of the five star hotels I've stayed in, and there have been many, Dear Reader.  The Cliffside is intentionally understated and informal.  It's an American beach hotel.

The guest rooms and public rooms are purposely plain and straightforward, carefully retaining an informal, beachy feel.  Very well-appointed and comfortable, indeed, but not self-consciously so.

The lobby/great room at the Cliffside
Image courtesy of same

There is a small café at the hotel that serves a continental breakfast.  Food can also be ordered from from the restaurant next door (more on that later).

The beach at the Cliffside, set with umbrellas and chairs for members and guests
Image courtesy of CocoCozy

The Cliffside is famous for its colorful beach umbrellas, which are put up every sunny day during the season on the club's private beach.

The umbrellas are carefully placed and spaced along the shore every morning by the very helpful and accommodating beach staff.

The Cliffside's beach boys
Image courtesy of Facebook

The club's beach boys are more than happy to provide the Cliffside's members and guests with lounge chairs, boogie boards, and towels throughout the day.  It's all very cushy, comfy, and just so.

A view of the Cliffside Beach Club's umbrellas in the 1950s
Image courtesy of NHA

The Cliffside makes every effort to ensure that its guests have a pleasant, relaxing visit.  I was pleased to learn that cellphones are prohibited in the club's public areas and on the beach.

In addition to being in a fabulous location right on the beach, the Cliffside has all sorts of facilities for the enjoyment of its guests.  It has two marvelous swimming pools (one for paddling around in and one for serious lap swimming), and also an inviting, bubbling hot spa pool.  One can get massages and other treatments at the Cliffside, and it also has a very well-equipped gym.  Reggie looked in the door at the gym once during his visit, and was impressed by it, but he didn't actually use it.

 

Although we enjoyed spending time on the beach during our stay at the Cliffside, we spent more time in the pool area of the club.

The Cliffside's pool area was quieter and less windy than the beach during our end-of-summer visit.  And—more importantly—it had direct access to the club's café service, so daytime cocktails were but a telephone call away . . .

The ever-helpful Vanessa, provider of cocktails
and other comestibles

. . . and delivered by the charming and amusing Vanessa, who was all too happy to serve us whenever the need for beverages and snacks arose.  Which was often, I might add, Dear Reader.

The "morning" towel

One of the things that impressed us about the Cliffside was the attention to detail.  At the pool area they change out the towels every day at mid-day with a differently striped towel for use during the afternoon.  We liked that.

The "afternoon" towel

One of the great pleasures of the Cliffside is its proximity to the Galley Beach Restaurant.  "The Galley," as it is known, sits on the same property as the Cliffside and provides room service to the hotel's guests.  The Galley is one of the more expensive restaurants on the island and draws a glamorous, well-tended crowd.  Patrons run the gamut from carefully preserved matrons carrying lightship basket handbags, Hedge Fund families bedecked in Lilly and Nantucket Reds, and international jet-set types just off the enormous boats that line the Nantucket Harbor during the summer season.  It is the Swifty's of the island, as Boy has often remarked.

The Galley Beach Restaurant, as seen from the Cliffside's entrance

The Galley is one of our favorite restaurants on Nantucket.  Last year, we ate lunch there three or four times during each of the two weeks we spent on the island.

Matches and the card from the Galley

The Galley has a terrific raw bar during the day, and the restaurant's food is delicious, inventive, and . . . comforting.  They have an extensive wine list, and also mix very tasty cocktails.  The staff is friendly, welcoming, and extremely well trained.  The Galley gets it more than right—in fact, it is pretty much perfection, in my view.

One has the option of dining outside or inside at the Galley.  We generally prefer to dine inside, out of the sun's direct rays, in the restaurant's breezy, open-air main dining room.

The Galley's dining room has views both of the hotel and the ocean.  It is a marvelous place to go during sunset, when one is assured of having a front-row seat to the summer's sun setting over the ocean—a rare treat here on the East Coast of America. 

The beachside view from the Galley's main dining room

We ate all but one of our lunches at the Galley during our stay at the Cliffside.  We didn't feel the need to go anywhere else.  Why should we, when the Galley is such perfection?

We did muster leaving the compound for several dinners in town, though.  I would highly recommend Dune for its inventive, beautifully presented locavore fare; Ventuno for its superb Italian/world cuisine; and Cru for the freshest-of-the-fresh seafood.  (Cru occupies the choice harborside location, right at the tip of Straight Wharf, of the former and decidedly inferior Rope Walk.)  Thank you, PVE, for recommending Cru on your charming blog—it was because of you that we went there.

A view of the Cliffside from above, taken on our last day on Nantucket

And with that, Dear Reader, I conclude this post about our extended Labor Day weekend visit to the island of Nantucket, a place that I first visited as a very small boy nearly fifty years ago.

Please note: Reggie has not received anything in return for his review of the Cliffside Beach Club & Hotel or of the Galley Beach Restaurant, and he does not expect to do so.  He has written this post entirely for the enjoyment of his readers, which is the sole purpose of this blog.

All photographs, except where noted, were taken by Reggie on his BlackBerry