Shelter Island ferry crossing
— — seven minutes across the water and the road slows down.
Not only on a wall.
“Two small ferries are the only way on or off Shelter Island. The North Ferry runs from Greenport on the North Fork, the South Ferry from North Haven near Sag Harbor. Either crossing is about seven minutes across a sheltered cut of Peconic Bay. Cars stack on the open deck. Gulls follow. The island on the far side keeps its own pace and the road from the dock narrows almost immediately under oaks. from the studio
Shelter Island ferry crossing, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Shelter Island sits in Peconic Bay between the North and South Forks of Long Island's East End. It is twenty-seven square miles, including the Mashomack Preserve, which covers about a third of the island and is managed by The Nature Conservancy. The year-round population is roughly twenty-five hundred and swells through July and August. There is no bridge: the only access is by two short car ferries, the North Ferry from Greenport and the South Ferry from North Haven.
The two crossings cover narrow, sheltered channels of Peconic Bay. The North Ferry runs roughly half a mile across Greenport Harbor in about seven minutes; the South Ferry runs about a thousand feet across Shelter Island Sound in five to seven minutes. Both run roughly every fifteen to twenty minutes through the day, year-round, and continue late into the evening through summer. Tides are modest. The boats are small open-deck vessels that take a handful of cars at a time.
Fares are paid on the boat in cash or by app, with a one-way car-and-driver charge plus per-passenger. Both ferries operate year-round in nearly all weather and only cancel for severe ice or storm. Summer mornings southbound and Sunday-evening northbound see the longest stacks, sometimes thirty minutes. Bicyclists and pedestrians board first. The villages of Greenport and Sag Harbor on either fork make natural ends of a day on the island.