After the bustle of Cape Cod's towns, the Cape Cod National Seashore really does come as the proverbial "breath of fresh air." These protected lands, spared by President Kennedy from the rampant development further south, take up virtually the entire Atlantic side of the Cape, from Chatham north to Provincetown. Most of the way you can park by the road, sometimes for a fee, and strike off across the dunes to windswept beaches - though in places parking is limited to local residents. A program of grass-planting helps to hold the whole place together; three feet of the lower Cape is washed away each year, and much of it is carried here by the sea to extend the seemingly endless beaches.

It was on these shifting sands, not then as denuded as today, that the Pilgrims made their first home. They obtained their water from Pilgrim Spring near Truro; at Corn Hill Beach they uncovered the freshly buried cache of Indian corn that kept them alive. After a couple of months, which they survived with the help of the Wampanoag Indians, they moved on to Plymouth (where the reconstructed Indian village at Plimoth Plantation, is based on one found at Eastham).

Displays and movies at the main Salt Pond Visitor Center , on US-6 just north of Eastham (daily 9am -5pm tel 508/255-3421, ), trace the geology and history of the Cape. A road and a hiking/cycling trail head east to the sands of Coast Guard Beach and Nauset Light Beach , both of which offer excellent swimming. Another fine beach is the Head of the Meadow , halfway between Truro and Provincetown on the northeast shore.

Cape Cod National Seashore

• Cape Cod National Seashore

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