Knotline - Hunter Owners Blog: August 2009

Charis’ Excellent Adventure – Part Five: The Hudson River

August 9th – 14th, 2008

With the boat put safely back together, it was tempting to make like cruisers and just hang out for a day of doing absolutely nothing. But it was Saturday, and the lively waterfront nightspot at Hop O’ Nose had a fireworks display scheduled for that evening… and that cinched our decision, for the sake of our crew. Neither of them much care for fireworks, neither man‐made nor the
kind that Mother Nature had been providing on a regular basis – it was time to move on.

Speaking of the crew, many people are curious how two active dogs deal with being on a boat all day. This is what they spend a great deal of their time doing: sleeping down below – especially when we are mostly motoring, as we had been during the past week or so. Southbound after leaving the Catskill Creek, we found the remaining three Hudson River lighthouses…

Kingston Lighthouse

Saugerties Lighthouse

Esopus Meadows Lighthouse

… and ended our day on a cozy, protected mooring at the Poughkeepsie Yacht Club. Rain settled in the next day and so did we, taking the “down day” we were craving… to reflect on how far we had come, and to shift gears for the next leg of the journey. From here on, we would work in the morning and travel in the afternoon (not necessarily in concert with weather, tides & current – more on that later).

After a morning of catching up with email and telephone calls, we headed south to Newburgh, NY… and perhaps one of our more challenging docking maneuvers. Urged on by the Dockmaster (a retired Navy Petty Officer): “Awh, c’mon Captain, there’s 45 feet for that 38 footer, you’ve got plenty of room…! ”, we “parallel parked” into the last available spot on the dock, in reverse, against opposing current and 15 knot winds. Bruce gets helm credit for that one! That’s us – the mast on the right, tucked in amongst all those power boats. After two rainy days cooped up on a mooring, we were all happy to find a lovely dogfriendly waterfront park, and a wonderful dinner at one of the open air restaurants. The clean, friendly and secure facilities at Newburgh Marina made our first “urban” stopover a pleasant and surprisingly peaceful experience.

Leaving Newburgh the next morning we passed the remains of a reconstructed Scottish castle on Bannerman’s Island, and entered the part of the river known as the Hudson Highlands. We finally had a beautiful sunny day and took the bimini down for the first time in over a week!

Our schedule didn’t allow us to stop at all of the interesting little villages along the riverbank, like Cold Spring, NY. This is just north of a dramatic turn in the river known as World’s End – and the majestic architecture of the US Military Academy at WestPoint. We were glad to have our trusty diesel engine, which meant we were not subject to the whims of wind and current that made this area such a navigational challenge to sailing vessels of days gone by.

Over the stern, we had another view of West Point from the south. It was clear to see why this was such an important fortress in defending the Hudson River during the Revolutionary War.
We also couldn’t help but notice the cloud formations far to the north. Monitoring the weather by radio as well as constantly watching the sky had become a part of the daily routine, and we were glad these clouds were far north of us.

Our next destination was the Tarrytown Marina, nestled directly under the eastern end of the Tappan Zee bridge; we landed just in time to catch a glorious sunset and a fun evening out with our good friend Kathy. The next two days were spent tending to business: company business
meetings with clients, as well as the serious business of catching up with laundry (over $20 in quarters!) and restocking our provisions.

Tarrytown is a large, friendly city marina… we recommend it highly, but there weren’t many wide open spaces to let the dogs run, and finding the requisite “patch of grass” proved to be a bit of a challenge.

Exercise, however, was not a problem. The transient slip we occupied was a loooong walk from shore.

With our business in Tarrytown completed, it was time to move on to one of our long awaited goals – sailing to Lady Liberty. We raised our sails for the first time since leaving Malletts Bay… and since there was little to no wind, we motor‐sailed under the Tappan Zee Bridge!

We approached Manhattan with the mighty Palisades to starboard, and a steadily increasing overcast to the sky. At first we thought this was just smog… but we were soon to discover that Mother Nature was gearing up for another show… One more, tiny red lighthouse, tucked
under a bridge… and as the buildings got bigger, so did the traffic and the chop. Sailing past the Statue of Liberty was impressive, but so too were the gathering clouds that urged us not to linger.

Our night in the “big city” was actually spent in New Jersey in a slip at Liberty Landing Marina. At $4 a foot it was anything but a bargain, but due to its proximity to the East River for our transit through Hell Gate the next morning, as well as security with the approaching storm, we decided it was worth the investment. (Turns out it was anything but, but we’ll save those details for another story!)

We were “escorted” in by a parade of ferries that also dock at this marina, and settled into the slip just in time to get the canvas settled and the dogs walked before the clouds burst.