Introduction to Truro

46 miles E of Sandwich; 10 miles S of Provincetown

Although Truro is one of those blink-and-you'll-miss-it towns, the location is great: a tranquil village between charming Wellfleet and rowdy Provincetown. With only 1,600 year-round residents (fewer than in 1840, when Pamet Harbor was a whaling and shipbuilding port), the town amounts to little more than a smattering of stores and public buildings, and lots of low-profile houses hidden away in the woods and dunes. As in Wellfleet, writers, artists, and vacationing psychotherapists are drawn to the quiet and calm. Painter Edward Hopper lived in contented isolation in a South Truro cottage for nearly 4 decades.

The natives manage to entertain themselves with get-togethers at the Truro Center for the Arts or, more simply, among themselves. A lot of money may be circulating in this rusticated community, but inconspicuous consumption is the rule of the day. The culmination of the social season, tellingly enough, is the late-September "dump dance" held at Truro's recycling center. For bigger kinds of excitement or cultural stimulation, Provincetown is only a 10-minute drive away (you'll know you're getting close when you spot the wall-to-wall tourist cabins lining the bay in North Truro).