Memorial Day on Cadence Part 2 – New York Harbor

On Memorial Day, as there was little wind but otherwise beautiful weather, we decided to turn Cadence into a motor boat and explore New York Harbor. Our friends Colleen and Rob were aboard. It's Fleet Week so a good opportunity to see some of the ships tied up in the Harbor. We also heard that Maltese Falcon was moored at Chelsea Piers. We had a long motor East out of Raritan Bay, hung a left into the Ambrose Ship Channel and fought the outgoing tide under the Verazzano Bridge and into New York Harbor. Docked to port, on the Staten Island side were these three beauties taking part in Fleet Week! The modern looking one is the USS New York. The New York is an amphibious assault ship whose bow is partially made with steel melted down from the ruins of the WTC in memory of 9/11. The three navy vessels were flanked by heavily armed Coast Guard ribs who came out and politely told us to get lost. Hard to Starboard!!!! We then headed up towards Manhattan on the Brooklyn side. As it was my first time piloting a boat in NY Harbor I was a little nervous. There's a lot of traffic and it's a quite a complicated place. There were tons of small sailboats (J24s, etc) buzzing around the fat part of the Bay. They were tacking and gybing around without a care in the world with ferries, fast boat taxis and tugs passing through at high speed. I figured if they weren't worried, why was I and calmed down a bit. Anyway The missus did most of the driving and as you can see, she wasn't fazed. The tip of Manhattan is spectacular from the water. There's not much like it. I can barely do it justice with my puny camera. This is yours truly. As you can see, it was a happy day! The second shot is Colleen with Governor's Island in the foreground. We then headed up the Hudson. This historic PT Cruiser popped up out of nowhere. Kind of an interesting surprise. We got up as far as Chelsea Piers (23rd Street) where Maltese Falcon was moored. She is so impressive from the water. It's a fascinating boat and this was her first time in New York. As we headed South we of course passed Lady Liberty. It's truly an amazing experience to get this close to her in your own boat. This is Rob and Colleen with you know who. We headed back home to Perth Amboy and to make a perfect end to the day, the wind came up for the last 10 miles and we had a great sunset sail back.