Magazine Beach

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Over 300 turned out at Magazine Beach Park last night for a perfect almost summer evening of picnicking, music, games and art. Neighbor Ken Field’s New Orleans Mardi Gras band the Revolutionary Snake Ensemble created a fun and funky ambience for picnickers as children delighted in Knucklebones’ very fun assortment of games and amusements. Whole Foods fed the crowd, first with their food truck, and then, later, with an unplanned feast—courtesy of the River Street store. Thank you, Whole Foods! Frosty’s provided ice cream. What could be better? To top it off, artists Ross Miller and friends marked the shoreline of Captain’s Island with little blue flags and artist Susan Israel marked, with stencilled fish, where the water may rise in 2050 and 2100. (Turn off your lights. Vacation at your local park. Let’s preserve our planet!)

Thank you to Tom Scanlon for playing a lead role in organizing and getting the word out about this event and to the many others who made it happen. This was the first of a full program of activities organized for Magazine Beach Park. This summer, come vacation at the beach, Magazine Beach!

Note: Our next event will be next Sunday, June 29^th, a benefit party to raise funds for programming in the park and park revitalization, at the Riverside Boat Club—the training grounds for many an Olympic rower. Please join us for wine, hors d’oeuvres, great conversation, river views, and live music! Tickets are $35 per person and tax deductible. Please make checks payable to: Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association, Inc. Note: For Magazine Beach Revitalization. Mail them to: Magazine Beach Committee, CNA, c/o Olivia Fiske, 131 Magazine St., Cambridge, MA 02139. Or purchase tickets on Eventbrite.

All of these events have been organized by the Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association, Inc., with partners the Massachusetts Department of Conservation & Recreation, the Charles River Conservancy, Riverside Boat Club, Cambridge Arts and the Cambridge Historical Commission. Our sponsors are Sanofi, Knucklebones and the Charles River Conservancy.

For a video of the Revolutionary Snake Ensemble performing at Magazine Beach click here.

Join us Friday, June 20, 5-8pm, for live music, children’s games organized by Knucklebones. and art installations that you help create! Bring a picnic and enjoy the almost longest day of the year. Music provided by the Revolutionary Snake Ensemble, a costumed funk & street beat improvisational brass band based in Cambridgeport. Food trucks, too! This will be the first of a whole series of FREE programs at Magazine Beach this summer.

The Revolutionary Snake Ensemble, led by saxophonist Ken Field, performs a unique blend of original and traditional New Orleans Mardi Gras brass band music. The group’s colorful costumes and creative arrangements have delighted audiences from Maine to New Orleans, and this July they will be performing in Roswell, NM and Venice, Italy.

Knucklebones will inspire athletics for all ages…for the love of play!

 Art Installations, that you can contribute to: Rising Tides by the Energy Necklace Project, looking forwards and making the invisible visible by showing future flood levels due to sea level rise, storm floods and climate change today, 2050, 2100. . Marking the Shoreline by Cambridgeport’s own Ross Miller, looking back, at the early 1800s shoreline of Captain’s Island. Yes, Magazine Beach was once an island!

And Foodtrucks: Whole Foods and Frosty’s Ice Cream Truck

Organized by the Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association, Inc., with partners the Massachusetts Department of Conservation & Recreation, the Charles River Conservancy, Riverside Boat Club, Cambridge Arts and the Cambridge Historical Commission.

Sponsored by Sanofi, Knucklebones and the Charles River Conservancy.

Note: In case of rain, this event will be cancelled. If it’s looking cloudy the day of the event, check here for weather updates.

Questions? Contact Cathie Zusy at cathzusy@gmail.com or 617-868-0489.

Location: Magazine Beach Park is along Memorial Drive, between the BU Bridge and Riverside Boat Club, and across from Micro Center and Trader Joe’s. It is at the foot of Magazine Street; there is a pedestrian bridge there to cross over to the park. It is a 15-minute walk down Magazine Street from the Central Square MBTA stop.

Join us for a full summer of events at Magazine Beach Park in Cambridge, MA (at the foot of Magazine Street, just across Memorial Drive). It’s time to go to the beach, Magazine Beach! For more information, go to our Facebook page (and once there, please like us!)

All events have been organized by the Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association, Inc., with partners the Mass. Department of Conservation and Recreation, the Charles River Conservancy, Riverside Boat Club, Cambridge Arts, and the Cambridge Historical Commission. Thank you to our sponsors! Sanofi, the Charles River Conservancy and Knucklebones.

Painting, Magazine Beach Park, by Cambridgeport artist Jeff Gardner

It’s time to head to the beach, Magazine Beach! This summer we’ll be offering a whole program of summer activities at the park, including Saturday morning yoga, Friday evening picnic concerts, a dance performance, and even the Bread & Puppet Theater.

* Family Summer Kick-off on Friday June 20, 5-8pm.  Picnic to the tunes of Ken Field’s Revolutionary Snake Ensemble while playing games organized by Knucklebones, and mounting art installations Rising Tides and Marking the Shoreline, led by Cambridgeport’s own Ross Miller and Susan Israel. Foodtrucks will be there, too! FREE!

*The pool opens June 28^th!

*2^nd Annual Benefit Party at the Riverside Boat Club on Sunday, June 29, 7-9pm. We’ve made great strides—work will begin on the 1818 Powder Magazine shortly—but there’s more to do! Join neighbors for an evening of live music, hors d’oeuvres, drink, and great conversation as you overlook the Charles River. To purchase tickets, go to Eventbrite, or send a check for $35 per person payable to the Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association, Inc., a 501c3 tax-exempt organization, to: Magazine Beach Committee, CNA, c/o Olivia Fiske, 131 Magazine St., Cambridge, MA 02139. Please RSVP by 6.23.14.

Thanks for your commitment to bettering our 15-acre riverside park.

All events have been organized by the Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association, Inc., with partners the Mass. Department of Conservation and Recreation, the Charles River Conservancy, Riverside Boat Club, Cambridge Arts, and the Cambridge Historical Commission.  Thank you to our sponsors! Sanofi, the Charles River Conservancy and Knucklebones.

It’s almost picnic season again! To honor this, this Saturday, June 7th, from 12-5pm, folklorist Millie Rahn will be collecting stories about Cambridge picnics in the Folklife tent at University Park on Sidney Street. She’s eager for: “memories, stories, and foods/traditions of picnics, as well as photographs, objects (picnic baskets, tablecloths, blankets, dishes, etc.), games, and other picnic lore.”

Magazine Beach picnickers, please share your tales! Click here, for more information about Cambridge River Fest (this year at Central Square). The information about the Folklife tent, go to page 10.

Also, many thanks to Novartis’s 80 volunteers for their clean up of Magazine Beach on May 22nd. According to organizer Danielle Stehlik, of the Charles River Conservancy, they: “picked up trash, raked leaves (under the overpass, in the sprinkler pool, and along the pathways), mulched the garden bed, and removed graffiti. They also fixed and painted benches between River Street and Western Avenue Bridges before the rain rolled in.” The park is looking so much better…

Some of the 80 Novartis volunteers. Thank you, and to the CRC, too!

Christopher Schmidt’s DJI Phhantom FC40 Quadcopter was flying over Magazine Beach last week and captured these views… Thank you, Christopher!

From Christopher, himself:

Over the past several months, I’ve been a regular visitor to Magazine Beach, at all times of day. As an owner of a new RC aircraft — specifically, a Phantom FC40 quadcopter — I’ve loved the open space of Magazine Beach for walking, and flying, in a beautifully scenic spot.

I’ve been able to fly at all times of day, from morning to night, and had conversations with dozens of people about the power of the quadcopter for aerial photography. Whether it’s filming rowers from Riverside Boat House along the river, catching an aerial shot of a little league game at Brud Whalen field, or just navigating the trees and picnic tables near the Powder Magazine, the park offers great oppourtunities for fun in the sun.

The great space, and great conversations with other people about this new technology and the benefits it gives for aerial photography, keep me coming back to Magazine Beach to enjoy a beautiful spot along the Charles River.

(Video music: Awesome Call, Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), CC-BY.)

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Just learned about this at our Earth Day Cleanup. Thank you to Andy Baer for sharing this March 1st story.

On our morning walk today Jane, Jack and I found this lady snowy owl hung up in a soccer goal at Magazine Beach in Cambridgeport. She had chased down the rabbit by her side. We didn’t want to just untangle her in case she was injured and took off so we called our friends at Cambridge Animal Control. Officer Alison P. came down with towels, cutter, and a cage. She and Jane freed her while I took pix(and a video that unfortunately didn’t come out…) and Jack our dog watched from the driver’s seat of the Cambridge Animal Control Van. Alison took the owl to the Animal Rescue League where it was determined to have been banded, to be a juvenile, have a small laceration, be a bit under weight and missing some tail feathers. She is being transported out to Tufts Veterinary School for rehab. All in all looks like a good outcome.

Andy Baer

 To learn more about the influx of Snowy Owls in Massachusetts this past winter, see and hear WBUR’s report on Snowy Owls Head South in Biggest Numbers in 50 Years. Most have migrated south by now, though one was just sighted at Plum Island and another at Duxbury Beach. To learn about bird sightings, see: http://www.massaudubon.org/get-outdoors/birds-birding/recent-sightings and http://massbird.org/sightings/.

Many thanks to all who came out in the rain for the Earth Day Cleanup Saturday morning, including volunteers from Momenta, Alumni of McGill University and Whole Foods. The Hale Street Crew, our State Rep. Jay Livingstone and stalwart neighbors also provided critical assistance. The park is looking much better! We picked up about 20 bags of sticks and dozens of bags of trash.

Great organizing, Charles River Conservancy, the Charles River Watershed Association, and DCR! And thanks to Whole Foods for the delicious fruit, to Jet Blue for all the snacks, and to all the other Earth Day sponsors.

McGill Alumni, thank you!

Whole Foods, fabulous, and thanks for the fruit!

Momenta, thank you!

Also, spring has sprung at Magazine Beach. Drop by and enjoy the cherry blossoms.

Hi All,

Looks like a rainy Saturday tomorrow in the low 50ies or so….

But we’re tough Cantabrigians and we won’t let that stop us from picking up sticks and trash at Magazine Beach Park, no siree!

See you at the parking crescent at the base of Magazine Street (near the pedestrian footbridge) with brownies, water (to drink) and other treats AND Earth Day t-shirts, of course.

Wear lots of layers and weather gear for a memorable morning of civic engagement.

The 15th Annual Charles River Cleanup will go on, up and down the Charles, regardless of the weather!

Cathie

See you there, rain or shine, for a morning along the River and the satisfaction of knowing that you’re helping out. We’ll provide water, snacks, work gloves and 2014 Charles River Earth Day Cleanup t-shirts. Organized by the Charles River Watershed Association, the Charles River Conservancy, DCR, etc. Spring is in the air at Magazine Beach!

Cleanup participants are invited to an after party at the Hatch Shell on the Esplanade from 12noon to 2pm. There will be refreshments, music and games and a chance to win jetBlue airline tickets! Your Earth Day Cleanup t-shirt is your ticket to the festivities.