Croton On The Hudson, Haverstraw, NY

We left Atlantic City yesterday morning at 5:30 AM. It was a very long day but not monotonous. It seemed like we played with the sails all day long. When we first started out the wind at the dock in Atlantic City was light less than 10 knots but when we got out on the ocean it was a total different story. It was around 20 knots with gusts as high as 28 knots. Fortunately it was on our port stern for a broad reach so were most of the waves even though the seas were a bit confused. We sailed with full sail until the wind started to clock, then we reefed so I didn't have to white knuckle it all the way. The winds would lighten and we would put out full sail, then they would pick up and we would reef. This went on until we were past Barnegat Bay Inlet when the winds clocked at which point we furled in the sails and motored the rest of the way to Lower Bay just before the NYC Harbor. At this point we were met by the clouds you see in the picture. Just imagine them ten times meaner than you see in the picture. Can you visualize it? Wind at about 38 plus knots the last time we looked. A wall of dense rain coming at us which meant we couldn't see the marks in the channel we about to approach. Did I forget to mention the sea water breaking over the bow and coming up over the dodger. Thank heaven for the dodger and enclosure, we would have been wet, very wet. Needless to say this was not mine or Larry's favorite part of the trip. The current was against us and we knew it would take another 2 or 3 hours to reach Liberty Park behind the Statue of Liberty so we opted to go to Atlantic Highlands behind the break wall. We intended to drop the hook but the Coast Guard came on the VHF and put out a warning for the storm we just went through and said the winds were clocked at 50 knots and more was expected with high winds following. We were very tired at this point and it was 7:30 PM. We wanted to sleep so we could get a fresh start today so we took a mooring ball at the Atlantic Highlands Yacht club. We were very glad we did because the wind howled most of the night but we didn't care.














This morning we stared out early but not quite as early as yesterday morning. We were under way by 7:30 AM. It was rough going across Lower Bay because of the wind direction and speed. Once we crossed the channel to the Verrazano Bridge in the picture the water had settled down and it was quite pleasant. The sun was bright and warm and we could actually see the bridge unlike last year coming North. We had dense fog last year and couldn't see the bridge until we were directly under it. It is amazing how the weather can change in a blink of the eye.















This picture is of Manhattan as we were entering the harbor. The picture can't express how exciting it is to see especially from the water. I was sitting there looking at it thinking of all the adjectives I could use to describe it and the list was very long.

It felt good to have the longest part of the trip behind us now.














We ask ourselves where does all the garbage go! Especially in the Big Apple! We'll your looking at it, the garbage scow. I don't know how this lucky tug driver got so lucky.