On the Water Again to New York and Beyond

So where were we? Oh yes, no motor! We got showers and some laundry done in Riverhead, Long Island. Thanks to Eric and Conrad Kreuter, owners of Moriches Boat and Motor, and boat repairman extraordinaire, Bill, our new lower unit for our motor arrived from Atlanta by 10 the next morning and we were off by noon.


Moriches Boat Yard - 18 inches depth at low tide.

 The weather was very rough in Great South Bay and we ended up anchoring for the night at the entrance to a small creek off Bay Shore. Now can I say that our sea trials are over? Here's hoping!

Verrazano Bridge

On Saturday, only on day behind schedule, we had a beautiful cruise down the Long Island Intracoastal. Its serene beauty can't be captured in a photograph. Pale green marsh grasses on both sides, small beaches which might not have been accessible by land, small sport fishing boats hoping to get one more weekend in, and gulls, circling close, hoping that we might be fishermen with bait to toss.



There is nothing like seeing the NYC skyline from the water.

At the end of Long Island, we started to get glimpses of the Big Apple skyline. The Verrazano-Narrows bridge was our entrance into New York Harbor. At the time the bridge was built in 1962, it was the longest span in the world. The engineers who designed her had to take into account the curvature of the earth. Thus the tops of the towers are farther apart than the bases. Because it was the weekend, there was virtually no commercial boat traffic. I asked Bill why we weren't seeing any other small cruising boats headed south. "They all left a month ago."  Great. Our trip into Manhattan on the Hudson River was much easier than I had anticipated. The chart and marks were good, the skies were blue and the seas were relatively calm.

79th Street Boat Basin

Arrived in NYC just after Halloween.

We got a slip at the 79th St Boat Basin, near the neighborhood where we lived 35 years ago and near the neighborhood where our daughter, Liz, had an apartment while in college. We pulled out our folding bikes and rode down to the Battery in the southern tip of Manhattan. It was a gorgeous day and I have to say that we must have seen close to 1000 people on bikes.  There is a walking/riding/skating trail all along the Hudson River, which is beautifully maintained by NYC. After our ride, we walked all through Liz's old neighborhood and had an outside dinner at a nice Italian restaurant that we used to frequent. The next day, we separately went shopping for supplies. What a glorious day Sunday was. In the afternoon, we walked down to Broadway to see the phenomenal Hamilton. Most of the original cast is gone, but the cast we saw was remarkable. Worth the first week, Bill!

 

Hamilton is about to begin.  How about those 3rd row seats!

In daughter Elizabeth's old neighborhood.

Early this morning (very early!) we were awakened by the heavy roll caused the weekday ship traffic. We got off as quickly as we could, hoping to beat the bulk of it. Not sure we did, because there is also heavy morning traffic from commuter ferries taking people in from Staten Island and New Jersey. Fortunately, visibility was great.


The Statute of Liberty in the distance

We were very low on gas and not finding anything in Manhattan, we had to go a couple of hours out of our way to gas up at a marina on Staten Island. Just learned that New York and New Jersey settled on the ownership of Staten Island with a sailboat race.  We then went on the most boring stretch of our trip so far along the straight New Jersey Shore. At noon, we entered the beginning of the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) at Manasquan Inlet, New Jersey.


 

  

Here we just entered the Intracoastal Waterway.

We were treated to a beautiful night with our friends, Mike and Jo Robinson, in Tom's River/Island Heights. Man, can they ever cook. We are now headed to Cape May, New Jersey on glassy, flat water.