She emerged from the mist

May 30, 2019 – We went through New York Harbor and saw the Statue of Liberty today. The End.

Well, maybe there was a bit more to it than that.

Some days teach you more lessons than others. Some days yield valuable experience that you just can’t get any other way. Some days are looked forward to with anticipation, or with apprehension. Some days are not at all what you envision. Today was one of those days.

It was foggier than forecast. ‘But it will probably burn off soon.’ No, it won’t.

Fast ferries are fast. Very fast. And big. Our AIS was great for seeing them miles away, but they close those miles quickly, and not always along the path you think they will take. To them, we must be like slow-moving slalom poles. Because we have an AIS transceiver, I am glad that they can see me on AIS as well, and make the small adjustments in their routine courses to avoid a collision. The Betsy Ross is going to intersect my course well before I got there. But when I got to that exact point later, at the very narrowest part of the channel, a small fishing boat was right in the center (‘you have got to be kidding me, dude!), and there was a ferry coming down from the city intending to run that same passage. Ughh.

As we came up to the Verrazzano Narrows bridge, I felt like I was in a real-life game of Frogger, trying to get to the other side of the channel where it seemed like there wasn’t quite as much traffic. Ready, set, go!

So, we enter New York Harbor, probably one of the busiest areas that we will encounter on the whole trip. In a way, we were fortunate to be coming in early, on a weekday, in crappy weather. Otherwise, there’d have been jet skis, kayaks, paddleboards, sailboats, and lots of other pleasure traffic also in the mix. In addition to the tugs, barges, ships, ferries, tourboats, and police boats.

We picked our way through all the anchored boats, slowed and veered around tugs and barges, tried to keep a consistent course for all the ferries, that seemed to pass benignly around us (kind of like the way traffic avoids the guy with the white cane crossing an intersection).

And then, there she was.

Coming by boat, we saw the lady and her torch much as many millions of immigrants must have seen her. At the end of a difficult voyage, promising hope for a new life. It could have been a sunny day. There could have been blue sky behind the golden torch glinting in the sunlight. We would have had beautiful shots of the busy harbor in all it’s colorful glory. But this was just as special.

We got as close to Liberty Island as we could, staying outside the security buoys, and made a tight circle while changing positions with our buddy boat, so we could each take pictures of the other’s boat in front of the statue. We gave a good show to the tourists on the island, and on the tour boat whose captain gave us a short blast of his horn to remind us whose water we were on.

And then, onward up the Hudson, bucking a pretty good current all the way to Croton-on-Hudson. Stunning pictures of the Manhattan skyline? Here ya’ go.

Up along Manhattan, past Harlem, under the GW bridge, past Yonkers (boy, New York City goes on for a long time, when you are going as slow as we are.)

We pass under the new Tappan Zee bridge, where sections of the old bridge still sit on barges. It’s beautiful and modern, unlike the early industrial version with girders and rivets.

And finally, we make it to Half Moon Bay Marina, to cap a long day on the water. The captain deserves a little something special today.