Heading north

Good-bye Long Island Sound, hello Hudson River.



Our last week in Long Island Sound was a taste of Fall. We left the Thimble Islands on a Sunday in the rain and the sun didn't shine again until Friday. The winds were so high and the seas so choppy we decided to sit it out in Milford, CT for two days. We weren't the only boaters unexpectedly enjoying the hospitality at the Milford Landing Marina. One boat tried to leave and came back, another ducked in after trying to head west from an anchorage just east of Milford.



When the winds dropped and the seas calmed, we left and went to the Larchmont Yacht Club. Everyone had said it was nice but a bit stuffy. We enjoyed it and didn't find it at all stuffy. Of course, it is summer, so they don't require jackets for men at dinner, as they apparently do in the winter. This was the first full service yacht club (lunch and dinner every day of the week) we've been in in a long time. Most of the clubs in Long Island Sound are small and very casual, many have no food service at all, just bars.



The sun finally came out when we left Larchmont. We went back down the East River and rounded the Battery in New York City, then went to a marina in Jersey City, NJ, right across the Hudson from southern tip of Manhattan. We had a great city view from the boat.



This morning we went up the Hudson, past the western shore of NYC, just us and all the ferry boats. Jim was amazed out how many ferries run between NY and NJ. Once we got under the George Washington Bridge, the boat traffic dropped considerably and we had a nice ride up the Hudson pushed along by the incoming tide.



We stopped in Westchester County, in a town called Croton-on-the-Hudson. We're here because we were recruited by the dock master. Jim posted a question on a boating listserv asking for recommendations on where to stay. Steve, the dock master here, called him to offer him a deal if we came here. There is an Enterprise rent-a-car agency less than 1/2 mile from the marina, so we will hole up here over the weekend, rent a car and see the local sites. The area is beautiful, the weather is perfect, and the local pizza parlor is well-reviewed on Yelp. What more could we ask for?