Trip Diary for June, 2007

Friday, June 1: We departed at 9 AM for the 305 mi. drive to Brewerton, NY to pick up daughter Sandy and son-in-law Klaus who were driving in from Noblesville.  Stopping along the way to shop and eat, we arrived at Ess-Kay Marina about 4:30 PM, in time to visit with proprietors George and Kim Mann about our scheduled arrival in a week.  Viewing the dock, we noticed Seas the Moment, Steve and Janie Merz.  The four of us took Kim's advice and went to DG's for excellent dinners.  Returning to Ess-Kay, we napped until Sandy and Klaus arrived at 10:45 PM.  Without stops, we returned to Belmar at 4:30 AM!

June 2-3; Liberty Landing State Park, NJ: After a sleepy breakfast and showers, we returned the rental car and dropped lines at 11:25 AM Saturday to make the scheduled Rt. 71 bridge opening and headed out the Shark Inlet to the ocean.  Weather was sunny with S 10 mph winds producing 1 waves with 1-2 ft. swells.  Wave heights increased to 1-2 as we reached Sandy Hook, the entry point to lower NY Harbor.  Commercial traffic in the harbor was minimal until the huge, beautiful Verrazano Narrows Bridge and our first good view of Manhattan. We now needed to avoid numerous water taxis and tour boats as we approached "the Lady".  Originally planning to anchor west of the statue and use the dinghy to board the only access means to Liberty and Ellis Islands, a ferry, we concluded that was not prudent.  We called the huge Liberty Landing Marina for a 2:45 PM, $4/ft dockage.  We could clearly see Manhattan from the bow and the Statue just above the dinghy. Tired from the previous short night, we ate a minimal dinner aboard and turned in at 8:30 PM.  In order to get some of a limited number of inside Lady Liberty passes, we were in line Sunday at 7:50 AM for ferry tickets.  Our first stop was Ellis Island.  The scope and quality of exhibits and the audio tour of Ellis were astounding.  It gave a real appreciation of the emotional experience steerage immigrants arriving here, not knowing whether or not they would be allowed entry or sent back to their port of origin, experienced.  Unable to finish by the 10:50 ferry to Liberty Island, we departed to reach Liberty before expiration of our 11:45 time window for the inside tour of the museum and 156-step climb to the base of the statue.  After completing our visit to Liberty Island, we returned to Ellis for a play, a 45 min. movie and a visit to the Wall of Honor before returning to the Lola Marie at 5:30 PM.  Rain from remnants of tropical depression Barry started about 4 PM and continued through the night.

Monday, June 4: By morning we had received more than 2 in. of rain and it was still coming.  After cold showers in the marina's lightship, we departed at 9:35 for a 40 mi. trip up the Hudson in the rain and light fog with incredible boat traffic in the upper harbor.  Shortly after entering the harbor the radar stopped working; fortunately, the fog was light with a mile of visibility so we continued.  With 10-15 mph S winds, following waves reached 2 ft. for most of the trip.  Haverstraw Marina is picturesque and nice, but remote from town.  Larry grilled steaks during a beautiful sunset.

Tuesday, June 5: We cast-off at 9:15 in partly cloudy conditions with light winds and soon view the imposing, beautiful West Point facilities.  The scenery along Hudson was magnificent with many beautiful mansions.  Adessa, Dave and Marla Russo, overtook us as we approached Kingston.  After exchanging radio updates, they slowed and followed us into Rondout Yacht Basin.  After docking at 2:40, they invited us aboard for wine and munchies and to meet their friends Sandy and Jerry Pryde.  We then offered to run a dinghy shuttle across Rondout Creek to the city.  As the first dinghy run arrived at the city dock, we met Steve and Jean Purdy, Suncat, who joined us for fine dinners at the Steel House.

Wednesday, June 6: Leaving at 7:45 AM to cover 67 mi., we got a good view of the neat Bed & Breakfast Lighthouse at the mouth of Rondout Creek. The river has several unique lighthouses such as the Hudson-Athens. Albany provided an impressive skyline before we reached the Troy lock that is the gateway to the Erie Canal. Waterford, about 3 mi. upstream, is a delightful city that provides a huge complementary dock.  Electrical hook-ups are provided, but because there were already about 15 boats docked, we were beyond that section. We walked about 3/4 mi. to the grocery store before enjoying delightful dinners at McGreivey's.  It was nice to again be in fresh water without tides.

Thursday, June 7: Leaving at 8:30, an immediate flight of 5 locks raising us 139 ft. provided our entrance into the beautiful Mohawk River which, for the next 90 mi., also serves as the Erie Canal before becoming intermittent with channelized stretches.  With Klaus and Sandy to help, it was relatively easy to use the provided lines while fending-off. The scenery along the canal was beautiful. The number of trains in NY has astounded us, a evidenced by our passage under this bridge with two meeting trains! By 2:45 PM we had covered 40 mi. and 11 locks before tying along the lock wall in Amsterdam for the evening. Its wall offered 20 A electrical outlets and was only 2 blocks from Russo's Tavern where we enjoyed good sandwich dinners.

Friday, June 8: A long day began with a 7:40 departure to cover 62 mi. and 8 locks.  Fultonville provided a uncommon canal sight: McDonalds. Most of the time we locked through alone, but at Lock #17 we had two other boats and could tie only to port. At green marker 573 we reached Utica Marina at 4:45 PM.  It provided free quality docks with dual 30 A electricity.  Temperatures reached 95 degrees with high humidity!  The city marina also hosts Kitty's on the Canal, a truly outstanding restaurant.

June 9-14 ; Brewerton, NY: What a difference overnight storms made in the weather: Saturday was cloudy and 59 for our 8:15 cast-off.  Lock 20, 6 mi. away, brought us to the 420 ft. level, the highest on the canal; from now to Lake Ontario we have only the easier down locks.  After crossing the large Oneida Lake, at 2:10 PM we reached Ess-Kay Yards where we had a month's reservation so we could travel to attend the 100th Anniversary annual meeting of ASABE, Larry's professional engineering Society, visit Larry's mother and attend a wedding of Lola's nephew.  We now had Leitem's car, but on their trip out a rear tire picked up a large nail that also damaged its sidewall.  After stabilizing the tire we enjoyed dinner on the Oneida River at the  Waterfront Tavern.  The 10 AM service at Brewerton UMC began Sunday.  After lunch aboard Larry and Klaus began major cleaning of the boat's exterior, including pressure washing of the cockpit's rug while Lola and Sandy took 4 loads of clothing and bedding to a nearby laundry.  All were tired from physical labor, so Klaus grilled chicken for a fine dinner aboard at 8 PM before he cut Larry's hair.  Klaus and Sandy departed Monday at 7 AM to get their tire replaced at the nearby Cicero Volkswagen dealer. Shortly after 9 they were on the road home.  We used the day for laundry and cleaning the interior of the boat. After a late breakfast, Tuesday morning we used the dinghy to remove the Cypress stain from the entire port hull.  Dave and Marla Russo, from Adessa docked adjacent to us, came over for drinks before we took the courtesy car to DG's for fine seafood dinners.  Larry began working on next week's speech for the ASABE banquet. Wednesday we completed the starboard hull cleaning, annotated 200 pictures taken over the last 4 weeks before grilling pork chops for dinner.  Larry's computer failed to boot; very untimely with all his speech material not backed on removable media Thursday was primarily devoted to getting ready for 2.5 weeks of land travel: packing, installing all exterior canvas, renting a car, and futile attempts to get Larry's computer back in operation.

June 15-30 ; MN, IN and IL: We left Ess-Kay Yards at 7:15 AM Friday for the 11 mi. drive to the Syracuse airport for the NWA flight to Minneapolis via Detroit and the 100th Anniversary meeting of the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers.  Flights were on-schedule and uneventful, just like you hope for.  Saturday through Wednesday were devoted to meetings and visiting many professional friends from around the world.  Larry used Lola's computer to remake the PowerPoint presentation for his 6 min. speech on the 100 years of progress by the Society at the Tuesday evening gala Centennial Celebration Dinner.  Thursday we rode with Wayne and Judy Skaggs back to W. Lafayette.  They spent the night with us before departing at lunch time Friday.  Klaus and Sandy arrived at 7:30 AM Saturday to drive us to Macon, IL to visit Larry's mother over lunch with sister Sharon and her husband George and then to attend the wedding of Lola's youngest nephew, Jeremy Kater, to Kelsey Jump.  It was midnight by the time we made it back to the condo in W. Lafayette.

June 25-30 ; W. Lafayette: After sleeping in Monday to recuperate from the recent hectic schedule, Larry took his Purdue computer in for surgery while Lola began catching up on W. Lafayette tasks.  Catch-up processes continued Tuesday-Thursday.  We also enjoyed having visits/meals with John, Leslie and Tyler and then the entire Leitem family on different days.  By Friday, Larry's computer was declared unrecoverable, wiped clean and a new Operating System installed, but without his many application packages; thus, it was virtually useless without another full day of effort on his part.  Saturday was filled with all the last-minute chores required for returning to the boat. 

Water miles traveled to date: 8,362; this month: 357.

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