Lobster pots piled up on a wharf in Rockport Harbor. The red fishing shack at the end is called "Motif No. 1" and is touted as the most often painted building in America. I didn't know that when I took the picture.
Rockport is one of the many coastal towns with a history of fishing and lobster trapping. To catch lobster, baited cages (called "pots") are lowered to the sea floor, their locations marked with buoys. The lobsters wander in but can't get out. Fishermen haul the cages up to their boats and remove the lobsters. As with most fishing, there are strict rules about how many and what size lobsters can be kept.
Fishing shacks on the water's edge in Rockport.
I ate lobster only once on this trip. It was in Kittery, Maine, just over the boarder from New Hampshire. Ken had a plate of claws and I ate a lobster roll, a salad of lobster meat made with mayonnaise and served on a bun. Delicious!
Wonderful photos thank you. I have been researching lobster recipes for a Thermidor, so you post was even more timely for me. Louise
ReplyDelete(I love that you have a category called "Wedding Trip" :)))
ReplyDeleteOoooh, I loved Rockport! My dad and mom told me about that "Motif #1" red fishing shack, and I do believe that we used to have a framed painting of it on the wall when I was growing up. Lobster, New England sea air, ahhhhhh. Thanks for going there so you could share this part of our country with us :))
Walt
ReplyDeleteTricky question: Are they soft shell or hard shell lobsters?
My brother and his family live outside Boston, so I'm in the area fairly often. On my last trip we went to Rockport--lovely town. And I always eat a lot of lobster! And oysters, and scallops, and fish . . .
ReplyDeleteEating lobster rolls on Herring Cove beach in Provincetown was an almost daily occurence for us as kids. Oh how we craved bologna! Those gray shacks look like they are going to tumble into the sea!
ReplyDeleteThat Red Shack (Motif #1) is the exact (I think)
ReplyDeleteplace that I took the photo of the men with their lobster pots! It might have been 1979 and I don't remember ever hearing it called a Motif!
Funny.
Lobster rolls were the typical way I ate lobster that summer I spent in Rhode Island, too!
As I remember they and lobster chowder were among the lowest prices on the menus.
Some of my favorite photos in that area include so many of those unpainted houses N.E. is famous for. Amazing that the wood doesn't deteriorate quickly.
Mary in Oregon
Oh, Walt the Fourth, your trip brought back so many happy memories for me. It was as if I was there. Rockport was one of my favorite places. I also took a photo of the fishing shack (back in 1979) not knowing of its fame.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I now am seriously in need of a lobstah fix! As they say in Boston, "Awnest to Gawd!"
On our last trip to Paris, Robb ordered a lobster that must have weight close to thirty pounds. It was huge and not something I would have considered for several reasons. I'm also pretty certain that the lobster halves they served us were NOT the one he ordered.
ReplyDeleteI am rather fond of lobster, but it is too $$ for me here to have more than once in a blue moon.
ReplyDeletelouise, thanks. I'm going to look up thermidor now since I'm not sure how it's made.
ReplyDeletejudy, it was all serendipity, as they say.
t.b., I'm pretty sure they were all hard-shell. Ken's claws certainly were!
survivor, it's a wonderful treat!
lynn, that was the first lobster roll I've had in many, many years. I don't even remember the last time.
mary, they're a perfect summer lobster treat.
mitch, cool. This is what blogging is all about. Along with the other stuff.
starman, crazy!
michael, true. I only ate lobster once, but I also had scrod a time or two.