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My father built the cottage in the 1950s, and it has been shared by five generations of the same family ever since. We rent it by the week for six weeks every summer, mostly to the same families, but we do have occasional openings, so please check our calendar.

There is nothing so wonderful as mornings at Drakes Island, when the air is windless and the sun is warm, or nights when the sky over the ocean is full of stars. This is where my father taught me the constellations. This is where I learned how to surf with a boogie board and build a dribble sand castle. This is where my cousins became my dearest (and now my oldest) friends, because we were all there together, outdoors all day and in the same house playing cards until we could no longer keep our eyes open. I want you to have the same wonderful experience with your family.

The north end of Drakes Island is a quiet neighborhood, with just one row of cottages on either side of the street, and a few more behind by the pine wood. Look for hedges of pink and white rosa rugosa, the occasional puff of hydrangea, drifts of sea grass, and summer lawns. The sandy beach is a half-mile long, with a river at either end.

When I was a small child, ours was the last cottage on the road. Even now, a dozen houses past this one, there's nothing but dune, beach, and then the Little River, where children float by on inner tubes, and the plovers and terns are protected by law.

Most people never leave the sand and water, but you really should take a walk up to Laudholm Farm, with its seven miles of trail and boardwalk along the salt marsh and up the hill through the old apple orchard to the great barn, the estuary research center, and the big yellow house ( open to the public).

It's all right out your door. Heaven, with the murmur of surf.