Sunday, June 28, 2009

Barnegat, NJ to NYC

We arrived at the Barnegat Inlet from Cape May late in the afternoon and woke really early to go to the Forked River to meet our friends Deanna, Guttorm, Olivia and Andre and their extended familjies at the Marina in which they keep their boat the "Abby J".

Deanna's parents Joy and Tom were great and had us over at their home on two nights which was great as it was raining and we got to visit not only with them and the Baadsviks but also with Deanna's sister Kara her husband Keith and their kids Jake, Maddie, and Sophie.

This was a boon for the kids as they got to have lots of buddies their age and all had a blast!



This is Maddie and Olivia.



Here are all the boys Andre, Jake, Alistair and Dakota. Probably up to no good...


This is Keith rowing Olivia and Maddie on the Forked river.


Guttorm was in fine form, the dads and kids all went sailing on Barnegat Bay. He and Deanna are part of a new start up jet charter company called "Zen Air". Deanna is back in the work force doing the books for Zen Air, before I left Guttorm gave me his Zen Air hat and is currently my favorite hat.

Here is the Alice anchored at Barnegat Light, you can see her new colors.

After the weekend we spent an extra day at Barnegat Light discovering the lighthouse and town, this is the view of Barnegat inlet from the lighthouse "Old Barney".

We left Barnegat light at 9:00 and motored in a windless day to NYC where we anchored at Liberty Park on the Jersey side next to the Statue of Liberty. Above is Dakota swinging from the rigging as we aproach the Verrazano bridge.
On our way out the next morning we passed the Statue of Liberty as close as the security perimeter allowed us and explained to the kids her significance. We headed for the 79th St Boat Basin which is a city Marina and therefore the best deal in NYC, I read another cruiser's blog that said you can pay 80.00 dollars plus a foot for docking in private Marina's. Ouch!! A mooring at 79th st Marina is 30.00 bucks period and you get free ice, showers and laundry. We spent two nights there, the Hudson can be very rolly during the day, because of big boat wakes so we planned to spend our days in the city and come back in the evenings when the river is calmer.

We spent our first day at the American Museum of Natural History, the kids really loved it, we spent a few hours there in the morning then took the subway to China town and had lunch at an
excellent and cheap noodle and dumpling restaurant. It was really good we all left happy.
If you've seen "Night at the Museum" this is Dum Dum give me Gum Gum, there were hordes of kids who all looked for him and took their pictures with him all the while saying "Dum, Dum give me Gum, Gum" I kept hearing "there he is!". It looks as if the movie has been good for the museum.
After lunch we spent time at Central Park this is the Shakespeare Garden.

Nearby in the park was Belvedere castle where we climbed to the top and the kids got to see the turtles that hang out in the sun on the lake below.



We got around the city by subway and bus, was nice to have lived in the city before as getting around made sense to us. We also went to the Metropolitan Museum or the MET where we spent a couple of hours, we knew that trying to do the marathon museum thing is a killer not only for the kids but also for us so we kept our visits short. A good thing to remember when you go to the MET and the Natural History museum is that these museums are by donation. They have posted suggested prices but you can pay what you want.

Laurel spent the afternoon walking around the city while the kids and I went to a movie. We had wanted to see Up but in NY 3D movies were more money 16.00 for adults and 12.50 for kids!

At the end of the day we got some goodies at a local supermarket on Broadway and I think 74th. We bought a bottle of white to go with it and enjoyed the evening on board overlooking the city. Doesn't get much better.



Saturday morning we caught the end of the ebb on the Hudson and the beggining of the flood tide on East river. The current really rips through the East river, while going through Hell's gate we found ourselves doing over 10 knots.




Here is Alistair swinging on the rigging as we pass the UN. Below is me with a bluefish we caught on Long Island Sound. Next stop for us is the Connecticut river where we'll stop and see Laurel's brother Mathew and his wife Nancy. Best, C.


2 comments:

S/V Veranda said...

Glad to see you took advantage of so much of NYC. I'm pretty sure we also recognized our old marina, Silver Cloud in Forked River. Great pics by the way.......

Heidi said...

We are so excited to see you guys getting closer and closer!