42°46′55″ N 73°40′27″ W
August 10 – Waterford, NY

We arrived in Waterford at 6:30pm this evening. Our travelled distance today was not all that great (about 35 nm) but we achieved a few significant milestones. Here’s a screenshot of where we are tonight.

When we leave Waterford we will be taking the river & canal system that heads towards Schenectady. If we headed north instead that would take us to Lake Champlain & Montreal …. perhaps another time, eh!

At noon today we stopped at Castleton on Hudson Yacht Club & rented their “gin pole” (aka yardarm or hoist) to lower & remove (unstep) our mast. While planning our trip last night we learned that once we were in the Erie canal system we would encounter multiple bridges that had a fixed height of only 20 feet & our mast is 27 1/2 feet high – so it had to come down in order for us to be able to go any further. With the mast down our height is now 15 1/2 feet to the top of the Bimini, so we can safely pass under all of the bridges that we will encounter.

Catherine ran the controls for the hoist & I looked after the rigging. Here’s what the mast & steady sail setup looked like before it was removed.

Now the boom & steady sail is removed.

Catherine did a great job as the crane operator.

And finally the mast was safely lowered.

We laid & lashed the mast & boom along the port side walkway & railing. It will stay secure there until we get “home”. I will not put the mast back up again as we will never really need it for the type of cruising we plan to do.

With the mast down the access & visibility at the back of the boat is also vastly improved.

On our way into Albany we encountered our first freighter since we left New York City. This particular ship was from St Johns, Newfoundland. We made sure they had lots of room to pass us by.

Shortly after we got through Albany we encountered our first lock in the Erie Canal System.

This lock lifted us approximately 5 feet & once we were through it there was no more tidal influence from the Atlantic Ocean & we are essentially no longer in salt water, but instead in fresh water from the Great Lakes watershed.

We finally arrived at Waterford at 6:30pm & have tied up at the town dock which is immediately in front of a series of 5 more locks in the system.

We plan to stay here tomorrow to do some boat chores (another engine oil change, etc. ), galley provisioning & some tourist time.

It’s approximately 175 nm from here to Oswego, NY on the shore of Lake Ontario. It will take us about 4 days to travel that distance.

The weather forecast for Oswego this weekend & for early next week is not all that great & because of that we would not be able to travel across Lake Ontario until the middle of next week – so we will not really lose much time by spending an extra day here in Waterford.

Cheers!

42°12′51″ N 73°51′36″ W

Aug 9 – Catskill Marina

Yesterday afternoon we changed our destination to Catskill, NY. There were more choices for marinas here & the town also looked appealing in the cruising guide.

Photo above – looking back the channel towards the Hudson River from our dock at the Catskill Marina.

En route to the marina we passed several lighthouses that were not the conventional pillar with red & white stripes.

These lighthouses all look like small mansions. Not sure if they were ever lived in but they all look well maintained on the outside.

After we got settled in to the marina we took a walk through downtown Catskill which was only a couple of short blocks from where we were docked.

The downtown area is full of small restaurants, antique stores & curiosity shops. The town also has dozens of fiberglass cats perched on short posts along the sidewalk. Each cat has a different pose & is decorated differently from the others. The photo below shows Catherine standing beside “The Great Catsby”. This fellow was wearing spats & had a martini glass between his front paws.

Catherine had cooked Tikka Masala the night before, so we had that for dinner & then began planning the next day’s journey, which will take us through Albany & Troy & then to the entrance to the Erie Canal at Waterford. We also learned that we will have to take down the boat’s mast as it is too tall to pass under all of the fixed bridges along the canal.

The top of the boat’s mast is 28 1/2 feet above the water & the maximum clearance under the bridges is only 20 feet. We will stop for the night in Waterford & use the mast hoists there to help us with this task. Once the mast is down we will lay it along the side deck & keep it there until we exit the canal system at Oswego. Then we will put it back up again.

We got up at 6:00am this morning to a gentle, misty sunrise.

Before we had a chance to leave the dock a few of the local neighbors & their kids dropped by for breakfast. Catherine fed them all some Quinoa that she had cooked last night to go with the Tikka Masala. I was happy to share my portion of the leftovers with the ducks 🙂

By the time we were ready to cast off the mist had rolled in from the hills above & our visibility dropped to less than 100 meters. We got as far as the marina fuel dock & decided to tie up there until the sun cleared off the mist.

Time for a second cup of coffee for me & another tea for Catherine. The fuel dock opened up at 8:00am so we topped off our diesel tanks & pumped out our holding tank. By the time all that was done the sun had burned off the mist & we were able to get back underway.

Cheers!

41°30′8″ N 74°0′15″ W

Aug 9 – Newburgh, NY

We left Newburgh at 7:00am this morning & are traveling about 55 miles north to a marina at Coxsackie, NY, which is about 20 miles south of Albany. It will take us between 9-10 hours to make this trip.

The weather today is much improved. Bright sunny skies & virtually no wind.

The water is much calmer today so the boat is running smoothly but we are still dealing with tidal influence. Hard to believe that the tides could be as powerful as they are this far inland but the falling tide combined with the river current has dropped our speed to just over 5 knots. That should change in a couple of hours when the tide starts to rise again.

We just met a tall ship on the river headed south. Pretty impressive site even when the sails are not up. Unfortunately we could not read the name on the transom.

Catch up to you later. Cheers!

Today we travelled from New York City to Newburgh, NY, which is about 50 miles north.

The sky was heavily overcast when we left the marina but fortunately the rain held off all day.

The was not much “traffic” on the river – mainly fast passenger ferries going back & forth from New Jersey to New York. Once those thinned out I convinced Catherine to take a turn at the helm.

She got the hang of it pretty quickly & before I knew it I had been demoted to deckhand – but that’s just fine with me!

Once we got about 15 miles north of NYC the landscape began to change quickly. The shoreline went from being heavily built up on a gentle slope to very steep cliffs in Palisades Park.

We passed under two new bridges that were under construction at Tappan Zee.

It was interesting to see them from a different perspective. One of the spans was completed & the other still had a little way to go before it could handle any traffic.

As we travelled further north the river began to get narrower but still remained deep – ranging from 25 feet to well over 100 feet in many places.

We went past the West Point military academy about an hour south of our destination for the day. It was a very impressive place.

The sky cleared up just as we arrived in Newburgh. A great end to a great day on the water.

Cheers!

We are still at Newport Yacht Club & Marina. We decided to take the day & be tourists but the weather did not cooperate. It was raining pretty steady through most of the day so we went to a nearby grocery store & picked up a big load of supplies for the next phase of our journey.

I tried to sneak some cans of Spam into the grocery cart but my moves were effectively blocked 🙁

After provisioning the boat we went over to the local mall & racked up some exercise while perusing several of the stores. Then we went back to the boat for dinner on board.

After dinner we walked along the seawall & took in the views of NYC & Manhattan. It was wet, but not miserable.

By the time it was dark the rain had pretty much stopped & we enjoyed seeing a full moon over the Manhattan skyline.

Cheers!