I slept in until 7 (?). I wondered why and discovered that cloud cover had kept the light level low. While waiting for the caffeine to boot my head’s RAM I enjoyed the swirling cloud clumps. Yep, picture time.
Here’s Liberty Thorofare and Mordecai Island, looking north to the center of Beach Haven.
At the foot of my street is Cotov’s boat landing, family owned and maintained for over seventy years, a unique reminder of Beach Haven’s past as a fishing community,.
There have been two generations of Cotovs know as Captain Bly. The third generation, young Nick Cotov, continues to maintain the property, rent boat slips, care for the martin houses, and harvest bait for sale to the island day-boat rental places.
The original fishing boat, the Sultan, has been on blocks since I moved here in 2001. She suffers a little more each year. At one time, the late Nick,Sr. had offered it to the Tuckerton Seaport. Not everything gets done. Hemmed in by Sandy debris, the vegetation moves to enfold her. Sic transit gloria. No matter; if my RAM continues to work, I’ll know where she is.
It’s hard for me to think about lobsters off-shore of central Jersey. Everybody knows they come only from Maine. But that wasn’t always so. The family worked lobster traps off-shore here for many years. Now, the traps age along with Sultan.
In the brush and vegetation that is engulfing Sultan and the lobster traps there is still the here-and-there flash of color, seeking to reproduce itself. As a centerpiece the wild aster says, even with a dark cloud cover, still, “It’s a beautiful day in Beach Haven.” Thank you, Walter Smedley (R.I.P.) for this wonderful statement.