Bob, back from raking clams and picking mussels.

Bruce, with his full bag. How are we going to prepare them today? "steamed, baked, on the half shell? All those and more!

Stephanie's bag of mussels, compliments of Bob. (Penny Too) (And, "my" Bob worked his fingers to the bone cleaning them.Thanks, Honey!)

Beautiful harbors in this part of the country.

I think this is sailboat country. I've never seen so many sailboats.

OOPS! 

Beautiful homes, tucked back in the hills along the shores.

Patty, Julia, Penny, and Stephanie, on Pied Piper, on Patty's Birthday.

Stephanie, slurping another clam on the half shell. She is loving this!

Mussels, in olive oil, garlic, and wine sauce, prepared by the beautiful, and talented Stephanie.

Clams on the half shell. Bob (Penny Too) had a lot of work to do to keep up with the group's demands

Steamed clams. Keep'em coming Bob!

OMG! # 2 and #3 for me are in there somewhere.

Visitors in the harbor, looking for a handout.

This boating stuff is hard work. Callie, napping, on the deck of Penny Too.

What a perfect end to another perfect day.

New York goose bumps

We are anchored out in the harbor at Watch Hill in Rhode Island, after seven fun days with Joe, Julia, Julia's nephew Brian, and six of their friends, who I can say are our new cruising friends now, but more about that in another blog.
We left our anchorage at Sandy Hook early Sunday Morning, July 1st, and headed into New York Harbor.  What a thrill, and lots of goose bump moments. As we headed into the harbor, we could see the city in the distance, but because it is larger than life, it looked close, but it was still a ways away. The harbor is a busy place, with ferries coming and going, ships, water taxis, Sightseeing boats, people sailing, and a whole lot of pleasure boats. Our first goose bump moment was the Statue of Liberty. What history this lady has. Can you imagine the feelings a lot of our grandparents felt, when they arrived in the US, and she was there, waiting to welcome them. From there we turned to starboard, and headed to Manhattan, with the new World Trade Center towering above all the other buildings. WOW! From there, we headed up the East River, through all the beautiful bridges of New York, past the Empire State Building, the UN, South Street Seaport, Rockefeller University, Staten Island Ferry Terminal, and many others. What a thrill to see New York from the water.

September Song (a goose bump cruise) out
Bob


Cruising by the Highlands, not far from our anchorage, headed for New York Harbor.

The Verrazano Narrows Bridge, the first bridge you go under as you head into New York. Not so narrow! That's a huge container ship passing under it that you see on the right.

Lots of fast ferries in the harbor.

We saw (dodged) many ships as we entered the harbor. 

Our first views of New York City. It looks like we are close, but it is still a good distance away.

 

Me, with the lady in the distance.

Two beautiful ladies!

All I could say was, WOW!

We're getting closer.

The new World Trade Center, towering above all the others.

This is how it looked from the helm chairs.

The Staten Island ferry terminal.

South Street Seaport

What a site!

The Empire State Building.

The UN.

Everything in NY is big. This Pepsi sign is about six stories high.

No, that house isn't on the ground on a hill, with trees etc planted in the yard. It's on top of about a 20 story building.

This is our plotter screen, showing us on the East River, headed into Hell Gate. The tide was running against us, and we were fighting a five knot current. Kinda like going up the rapids. We were at 3.9 knots at this point, but we were down to 2.7 knots at one point. I was a little busy navigating Hell Gate to take a picture.

The great bridges of New York.