Sandy and I read an article several years ago that proclaimed the 35 best seafood shacks in the USA. Turns out 15 of them are in New England!!! We decided to visit them all, interlacing restaurants featured on Guy Fieri’s DDD stops when possible. We planned the trip in our Mobile Mansion for 2020 but were foiled by the arrival of COVID-19. Planning resumed in 2021 and we chose the travel shoulder month September hoping many of the summer visitors would be back in school/work/whatever. Great choice.
Our itinerary took us from home at the farm in PA east through New Jersey to Clinton, CT, then on to Cape Cod and Gloucester, MA, North Hampton, NH (simply to get the NH sticker for the motorhome-travelled map on the side of the full-wall slideout of the coach) and Boothbay, ME. So here we go.
The first overnight was at a KOA south of Williamsport, PA. Out of the way but OK. After travelling through New Jersey and north of New York City,
we arrived at our first stop, Clinton, CT, on the Connecticut coastline.
Shack number 1 was the Lobster Landing in Clinton. A true shack with outside tables on a harbor, we shared the first of what would be many lobster roles cups of clam chowder, and lobster bisque. Excellent
We stayed at a large RV/Trailer Park near Clinton. Site was small and not level. Oh well, we’re here for the seafood anyway.
Dinner that evening was at Abbott’s Lobster in the Rough in Noank, MA, the second shack on the list. Great food., Sandy shared a New England Seafood Feast (Lobster, steamers, mussels, slaw, etc.) and I shared an order of steamer clams. I had to recall how to eat the steamers; grip the black outside of the snorkel and suck the clam out of it!!
The next day we travelled to New Haven to drive around Yale, shop and of course lunch on seafood. One of the best seafood joints is D’amatos Seafood II on Whalley Ave. Small (8 tables inside) but highly rated. We enjoyed a fried seafood dinner for two. We take home a box!!!
Our next stop is Dunroamin’ Trailer Park (with several RV sites)
near Hyannis. We will complete our tour of Cape Cod while in this park. It’s not the nicest place we’ve stayed but there are not many RV park options here. We would have liked to stay at the Coast Guard RV park but no sites were available. This is the road to our site!!!!
The next day we travelled to Hyannis for a 5-hour cruise to find whales with Hyannis Whale Watcher Cruise. An outstanding choice resulting in multiple close-in sightings. Humpback (baleen) whales, ocean sunfish and rarely- spotted harbor porpoises. A very knowledgeable marine biologist narrated the tour.
Dinner that evening was at Spanky’s Clam Shack in Hyannis. Lobster? You bet!!
The next day we visited Woods Hole, the home of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) and the submersible Alvin, for 50 years the best research submersible in the world. Sadly most of the WHOI
exhibits remain closed by the pandemic. We were able to enjoy the Visitor’s Center. Lunch in Wood’s Hole was at Shucker’s, a DDD dive. Excellent again.
We can’t eat out all the time so we visited a seafood market in Sandwich, MA and took home 3 pounds of steamer clams and a couple of stuffed quahogs.
It’s time to continue our search for more of the 15 shacks we came to visit so we headed north on Cape Cod to lunch at Arnold’s Lobster and Clam bar in Eastham. CLOSED FOR THE SEASON!!! I now know to call ahead!!
On to Provincetown. An early haven for artists and subsequently LGBTQ folks, we enjoyed a bit of an irreverent walking tour of this town with an individual posing (garb and manner) as Anne Hutchinson, a colonial firebrand. Fun time. Lunch was at another shack, John’s Footlong. Known for its footlong hotdogs, they also served a good lobster roll.
We have by thjis time developed a hankering for oysters so Sandy Googled same and came up with an oyster happy hour at The Port Restaurant in Harwich. Wonderfully sweet yet briny oysters at a buck a shuck!!!
More to come………………..
Tallman Travelers 