The Boston Harbor Cruise Whale Watch provided an opportunity to get a  peak at 2+ of the lighthouses that protect Boston Harbor.

As I mentioned before there are 2 Boston Harbor Cruises that feature Lighthouses. Expert members of the American Lighthouse Foundation narrate the tours. They begin in Boston with passes by Long Island Head Light and Deer Island Light, and then a pass by Boston Light, the oldest lighthouse station in America. Heading north, the tour will pass by Graves Light, Hospital Point Light, Marblehead Light, Fort Pickering Light, Baker’s Island Light, Eastern Point Light, Ten Pound Island Light, Straitsmouth Island Light and more. The Northern Lights tour culminates with a view of Thacher Island, site of the only still operating twin lighthouses left in the country.

On our jaunt to look for whales we passed Boston Light with Graves Light behind it.

From certain angles the two lights line up front to back. Boston Light is located on Little Brewster Island in Boston Harbor. The current lighthouse is not the original structure.

During the American Revolution, the original lighthouse was held by British Forces and was attacked and burnt on two occasions by American forces. As the British forces withdrew in 1776, they blew up the tower and completely destroyed it. The lighthouse was eventually reconstructed in 1783, to the same 75-foot  height as the original tower. In 1856 it was raised to its present height of 98 feet.

Graves Light is visible from Little Brewster Island and Boston Light. Graves light is located on The Graves, the outermost island of the Boston Harbor Islands National Recreation Area, 9 miles  offshore of downtown Boston.

Minot’s Ledge Light, officially Minots Ledge Light, is a lighthouse  on Minots Ledge,  one mile offshore of the towns of Cohasset and Scituate, to the southeast of Boston Harbor. It is a part of the Town of Scituate. The current lighthouse is the second on the site, the first having been washed away in a storm after only a few months of use.

The Nantucket Lightship which we passed moored in Boston Harbor is now a museum. The Lightship Nantucket or Nantucket Shoals was the name given to the lightvessel that marked the hazardous Nantucket Shoals south of Nantucket Island. Several ships have been commissioned and served at the Nantucket Shoals lightship station and have been called Nantucket. It was common for a lightship to be reassigned and then renamed for its new station.

At 8:00 a.m. on December 20, 1983 the Lightship 613 was relieved by a Large Navigational Buoy, making Lightship 613 the last Lightship on station in the US and on Nantucket Station. In December 1983 the Lightship 613 was sold to the New England Historic Seaport to become a museum ship in Boston.

So lets see. So far this summer I’ve seen Gurnet Light, Bug light (Duxbury Pier), Chatham Light, Boston Light, Graves Light, Minot Ledge Light and the Lightship Nantucket.

But there’s more. I’m not done yet! Tomorrow we go to Gloucester and Cape Ann.