Baja Boys Sail to New York City (Sept 23)
Orient Point, Long Island to Port Jefferson (Sept 22) / Port Jeff to Port Chester Yacht (Sept 23)
(Friday, Sept 22) We're falling a little behind on our updates. Too much fun I guess. Weather overnight in Orient Point was a little cold. The Baja desert boys got a little cold during the night.The picture below gives a view of the "fishing camp" as Richard mentioned. We are on our way out of the marina entrance and you can only image how this felt in darkness as we entered last night.
Weather
was forecasted for light & variable maybe 5 kts today and unfortunately
they were right this time. We motored around the eastern tip of orient
heading up around the north shore of Long Island avoiding
a shoal marked by the lighthouse to the left. Tidal currents over the
shoal attracted lots of fishing boats. Weather warmed nicely by noon
while we took advantage of the flat seas to work some of the final
issues and rig tuning on the boat. At our present rate we should make
Port Jefferson by 8 PM. Good news arrived at 3:30 when the wind appeared
abruptly
at 20 kts. Looks like we will fetch Port Jeff by 6:30 with a little
time for sightseeing.
.
Port Jefferson is a good size bay on the north shore of Long Island with sand spits creating a narrow entrance producing protection from everything except north winds. Rain threatens as we enter the bay with a huge power plant on the west shore. It's Friday night and there is lots of activity on shore making it impossible to stay on board for a quiet dinner as we had originally planned. In short order we were on a mooring ball and in the launch heading for shore. Laura our friendly driver informed us we had less than 2 hours before she quit for the night. First order of business was Friday night happy hour at "Bill's Bar". You can see the crew highlighted above. The visit ended with all of us racing for the launch dock, Richard and Kerry with pizza in hand and Bill and I with supplies and a fresh supply of chocolate treats which had somehow been exhausted during the day.
Sept23
We wake watching a monohull hoisting their anchor in full weather gear
and a weather report of rain and winds. Temps were much warmer last
night so the rainy condition doesn't seem so bad. Next destination
Greenwich on the Connecticut north sound shore. After "breakie" (Australian
for breakfast) we head out with winds building as we near the harbor
entrance. We decided to put in a reef as we clear the entrance
with rain and 20kts on beam putting Greenwich directly in our sights.
It's sure nice to be able to stand in the salon door and steer out
to the rain!
.
Richard started the leg but quickly decides we should get our share of steering in the rain. We're moving at 7 - 8 kts and what we thought would be an all day sail turns into 5 as we pull into the Greenwich harbor before 3. Greenwich is an upscale area with estates and boats like in the photo above. We motored to the back of the harbor to Hotel Delemar where we thought we might get a dock. Nothing but mega yachts here. We did meet and Aussie who gave us info about the area. Too expensive to stay here! We made a second attempt at the Indian Garden Yacht Club but they only offered a mooring exposed to the south winds and that won't work.
Not finding dockage in Greenwich
turned out to be a good thing as we made our way down to Port Chester
where there are more options. As you can see the homes are not the
mega estates but sill nice on the beaches of Port Chester This bay
has a deep river with lot marinas and boat yards on it. We spotted
a small
marina
right
at
the
river
entrance with an open dock and lots of people on the deck above. Finders
down, we're stopping here. We were met at the dock and found out it
was a private yacht club but we were welcome. Richard talked to the
commodore
and got permission to stay the night on the dock and it wasn't long before
we were setting on the upper deck drinking beers with the club. Port Chester
Yacht Club is the common mans yacht club and they like to drink their budwiser
and speak with a heavy New York accent. After further discussions we find
that most have a Portuguese heritage.
Club members Tony gives Richard New York East River navigational tips
while Scott shows photos of his destroyed boat from Hurricane Ignacio
which
surprised
everybody in Port Chester. This entire area suffered lots of boat
losses as boats broke loose from mooring and smashed on the beach.
After a long walk in the neighborhood we came back for a late dinner and made our plans to head to New York City tomorrow. Forecast is for rain but weather in the low 80s. We hope to get an early start.
Until the next Up
date.. The Gato Loco Baja Boys.
Email us at emailsailors@gatolocosailing.com