Now That’s An Early Start!
Saturday 12th June 2021
4am is an ungodly time of day to get up! However, 4am in June is a lot easier to take than 4 am in December and in all honesty I like the early morning once I am up. We needed to make an early start in order to catch a positive current up the East River through New York. We had a quick cup of coffee and were under way from Atlantic Highlands shortly after 4.30 am and already the sky was starting to lighten. The swells in New York Bay were bigger than we expected but we made good progress and arrived off the Battery just as the “flood” was starting to flow quite briskly in the direction of Long Island Sound. I had great expectations of stunning early morning light against the New York skyline, but unfortunately the skies were mostly cloudy and grey. Our speed over the ground steadily increased from about 6 knots as we progressed up the river until we reached Hell’s Gate and we were making 11.5 knots, which might be a boat record at this point. Of course this was the section where we met an oncoming tanker but we didn’t have any problem avoiding it. As we emerged into the south-west end of Long Island Sound we raised our main sail and continued to motor-sail almost directly into a strengthening north-easterly breeze. The next fifteen miles to Oyster Bay were a bit of a trial. Having been super overheated a few days ago we now found ourselves in 60oF temperatures with an apparent wind of close to 20 knots coming across the deck. We were delighted to finally set anchor just before 1pm and retire below for lunch.
This afternoon Gloria and I took a quick dinghy ride into town whilst Sheila rested her leg (suspected calf muscle tear) and this evening we are happily relaxing.
Mike
40 53.070 N, 73 30.759 W
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