Tales From The East End: Orient Point, AKA The Other 'The End' ....

That's Rhode Island On the Other Side... Then, Nothing.

If you've even been on Long Island, you've probably seen stickers for Montauk Point.. It usually says 'MTK' (which isn't a misspelled sticker for Martin Luther King, Jr.) , or simply 'Montauk: The End'. It sounds like a bad title for book, but it's because Montauk is the end of Long Island ....... or so you'd think.

Nope, we hate to tell you, but you're only getting half the story there... Long Island has TWO FORKS. Montauk is the South Fork, with it's sandy beaches and endless summer nightlife. The end of the North Fork is Orient Point. It's like night and day from Montauk. Orient is very sleepy, except for the ferry to Rhode Island. And the beaches? Here's an example....

Yep, endless miles of pebbles - ground out by the glaciers from the last Ice Age, creating what is now Long Island Sound...

See, I WAS paying attention in History class back in Junior High .... or was that Science class? Anyway, this is Truman's Beach, also known as Hard Beach, for obvious reasons. Sandals or footwear of some type are required equipment here. However, they make for excellent oysterbeds just off the water. Just grab a knife, and start hacking.

I'll be honest. At this point, my anxiety really started getting the best of me here. I'm not a fan of open water, and being surrounded on three sides by ocean, and the fourth side ending soon got me a bit claustrophobic. So, we went to Orient Point State Park, snapped this quick photo of the Orient Point Ferry crossing Block Island Sound, and hightailed it home.... Yes, I AM a sissy...

This concludes our series on the East End. We hope you enjoyed seeing these places as much as we did going there. We've got a couple other ideas for places to go, so keep and eye out for them soon...

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