But rainy days on Cape Ann aren't bad either.

In fact, that is the best time to visit the art galleries and museums that dot Cape Ann, while glimpsing the rocky shores, coasts, the fishing boats and the sea, all noted for attracting major American artists for decades.

Major art attractions include, the North Shore Arts Association, Rear 197 East Main St., in Gloucester; the Rockport Art Association, 12 Main St., in Rockport; and the oldest working artist colony in the country on Rocky Neck in East Gloucester.

There are also many, many small jewels of galleries to be found on a casual drive down each Main Street of Cape Ann, as well as in the many nooks and crannies that split off from those main roads.

Early American artists of the magnitude of Theresa Bernstein, Fitz Hugh Lane, Marsden Hartley, Milton Avery, John Sloan, Stuart Davis, Max Kuehne, William Meyerowitz, Winslow Homer and sculptors Walker Hancock and Paul Manship have lived and painted in many of those nooks and crannies, most still occupied by late 20th-century artists who aspire to the tradition their mentors.

New York artist Theresa Bernstein Meyerowitz, at the age of 108, still summers in her East Gloucester home, and sculptor Walker Hancock, at the age of 96, still resides in his home in Lanesville.

Great artists' works can also be found in the Cape Ann Historical Association, 27 Pleasant St., in Gloucester, which houses the nation's largest collection works by Fitz Hugh Lane and also features early American decorative arts and furnishings, fisheries and maritime history and the history of granite quarrying.

Other major museums include, Hammond Castle, Hesperus Avenue, in Magnolia, built from portions of homes and churches abroad to house the art collection of inventor John Hays Hammond Jr.; Beauport Museum, 75 Eastern Point Boulevard, in Gloucester, summer home of Henry Davis Sleeper, featuring furnishings and interiors from different periods of American life in 45 rooms; the Sargent House Museum, 49 Middle Street, in Gloucester, the 18th century home of writer, activist Judith Sargent Murray; and the Paper house, 52 Pigeon Hill St., in Rockport, built in 1924 mostly of newspapers, including chairs, lamps, tables and other furnishings.

As with the art galleries, many smaller, but not less important, museums can be found along the roads of Cape Ann, including the Shipbuilding Museum, 66 and 28 Main St., in Essex; the Manchester Historical Society, Trask House Museum, 10 Union St., in Manchester; and the Sandy Bay Historical Society and Museum, Sewall Scripture House, 40 King St. Rockport, in Rockport.