After the anchorage at the Statue of Liberty, we got to travel up the East River, through Hell Gate to Long Island Sound. We’ve been spending the past few nights in Port Washington, a quaint port town and an easy train trip into New York City.
On the way up the East River, we were treated to views of Brooklyn and Manhattan, including the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building. There is something completely different about viewing a city from the water, especially New York City which is so large and so connected to the rivers around it.
Hell Gate was originally Helle Gadt, named by Dutch explorers in the early 1600s. The anglicization to Hell Gate seems apt, for it’s the area where the currents of the East River, Harlem River and Long Island Sound converge. The confluence of currents can pull a boat in unexpected directions if you aren’t paying close attention! The tides are very strong, exceeding 4 knots at times, so we timed our journey carefully to have the tides help us through, rather than slow us down.
We’ve really enjoyed Port Washington. It’s a beautiful town that is cruiser friendly. For only $35 per night, we are staying on a town mooring. That rate includes unlimited water taxi service, and the service will drop us pretty much anywhere along the waterfront we want to go! As examples, we’ve taken the taxi right to restaurants, the local grocery store, Target and West Marine, and a laundry service. The taxi captains all seem to have grown up in the area, so every ride includes stories from back in the day when the bay froze and was walkable, and when teenagers would ride their bikes in the sand flats (much of the cement in lower Manhattan was created with sand from this area).
In addition to exploring the town, we’ve taken advantage of its proximity to New York City, with an easy journey to Grand Central or Penn Station via the Long Island Railroad.
- We’ve met friends and family for meals in Manhattan and Brooklyn
- We visited the Tenement Museum. It’s a series of apartments in two buildings on the Lower East Side renovated and decorated to appear as they did in the 1800s and early 1900s. Guides lead small groups into the spaces and then tell the stories of the families who lived in them, based on research by the museum historians. Highly recommend!
- Jim visited the 9/11 Memorial, which was very moving.
- Anne got to visit the Museum of Modern Art, a favorite on a hot summer day.
- We opted for a hotel night, in a room overlooking St Patrick’s Cathedral in Midtown. It meant Anne got to take her morning run in Central Park. Since the boat is on a town mooring and the mooring balls are pulled and inspected every fall, we felt safe leaving it overnight. If we’d anchored, we’d likely have worried more leaving Tilia unattended.
The highlight of the trip, however, was our day with Tim, Anne’s cousin, and his wife, Kate. They came out from their home in Brooklyn to spend the night with us on Tilia, and then we drove out to the tip of Long Island to a Cornell Cooperative Oyster Farm. Tim and Kate bought oyster spat (oyster larvae) and are now responsible for caring for them. Once grown, the oysters are theirs to eat. This care includes a visit every 3-4 weeks to clean their cages to allow for good water flow so they can eat and grow. So much fun (and a little grubby) to see how oysters are grown!
We rounded out the day with a visit to Greenport, a fishing town on the North Fork of the island, and then Orient Point County Park, the further most point on the island. We will be heading there soon on Tilia, on the way to Block Island and then Newport. We stopped at a roadside stand for fresh oysters and then at a local beach to enjoy them. Tim did his best to teach us how to open the shells, but we have lots of room for improvement there! All in all, a great day.
