When I found out that I’d be second shooting a wedding on the weekend of my birthday, I’ll have to admit that I was anything but thrilled. But when that weekend morphed into a a fantastic mini-vacation in a town (and on an island) I’d never visited before (with a little work mixed in), I quickly changed my tune.

Friends had been urging us to visit the wonderfully unique village of Provincetown, at the very tip of Cape Cod, for awhile, and after spending 3 all-too-short days trying to visit as many shops, galleries, and restaurants, and trying to see as many sites and neighborhoods as possible, we’re anxiously awaiting our next visit to finish the task.

Before the Pilgrims settled in Plymouth, they first set foot in what is now Provincetown. Eventually they chose to leave for the mainland for a number of reasons, but I’d have to imagine the choice was not an easy one. Provincetown and the Cape Cod National Seashore are completely loaded with natural beauty in a wide variety of environments – protected harbors, sandy beaches, rolling dunes, coastal forests, and jagged dune cliffs. After the fishing and whaling industries died down in the area, the town developed into a thriving artist community, and to this day, local artists’ galleries line commercial street and their work can be found all over town. Meredith and I were delighted to see how dog-friendly the town was, with literally hundreds of happy dogs and their owners around almost every corner. There was so much to see and do, that even just exploring the various parts of town and taking in the quintessential Cape Cod architecture was a sizable part of our trip.