We stayed at the "Plum Pirate" over July 4 week. The house is well maintained and has comfortable sized rooms. It is even nicer than the photos show. The ocean is across the road, can see it over the dunes from the huge deck. There were plenty of beach chairs for us to us. There is a nice little tree shaded back yard with a table that is perfect for morning coffee (the house faces east and it is very sunny/warm out front first thing!). Other nice touches were outdoor shower, tons of towels, and central a/c, which I never thought I would need on the ocean.

The beach across from the house was not at all crowded, despite it being a hot sunny holiday week. At high tide, the slope is steep. The currants are quite strong. This was my kids' first ocean trip, and they were not intimidated by it. We had to go buy boogie boards for them to play with. We bought a pass to the nature reserve, and that beach was a little less wild. None of these beaches had lifegaurds. When I was the only adult with the kids, we made the short drive to Salisbury Beach, just for the guards. I felt much safer, but my normally wimpy girls declared it too boring. They wanted the bigger waves.

Plum Island was a great location to do a little north shore touring from. We spent time in Salem, Boston, and Gloucester. It was easy to get to the commuter rail or to the main routes (1, 1A, 95). Pam provided great directions and local information.

One drawback is the light from lovely windows that you see in the photo above the deck. The sun comes screaming in at first light, directly into your face. There are curtains on the doors, but the do not bock much light and do nothing for the windows. If this could be an issue for you, bring a sleep mask. There also is a problem on both sets of curtains above the french doors (not properly secure so very touchy). Hopefully this is fixed before it causes damage.

A nice bonus of this property: Fireworks can be viewed on the deck from 270 degrees! Salisbury beach and Hampton beach are visible from the deck, and there seems to be a local competition between the front beach and the basin properties. We didn't find this disruptive at all, it wasn't cheap noisemakers rather very impressive displays.

I would definitely recommend this property.

Wife, husband (43) MIL, and three girls (7, 11 and 13)