Saugerties and Kingston, NY

Friday September 24
Castleton on Hudson, NY

Phil coming back at sunset in dinghy in Castleton, NY

Today is a layover day in Castelton on Hudson, NY after anchoring Thursday night.  Phil was able to get the same mooring ball that we had Wednesday night, so we spent another day on Changes.  We did take a dinghy ride into the boat club to take showers, but otherwise, it was a pretty lazy day for us.  I'm starting to have enough of the peace and quiet.
 
Saturday, September 25
Distance Traveled:  30.33 nm
Total Distance: 496.58

Now that we had the mast stepped, we decided to go to Saugerties, NY and anchor in the Esopus (S- long O- Puss) Creek.  We left at 715am to take advantage of the current for the outgoing tide - which gave us a 1 - 1.5 knot current advantage most of the trip which meant the GPS showed that we were going at least 7 knots while the knot meter on the boat said a knot less. We did follow Skipper Bob and anchored close to the protected area in front of a public park past Lynch Marina, though we didn't realize until later that it was a public park.  The winds were variable and light and it was in the mid-80's.  As we were traveling, the winds were from the north about 6-7knots and we were going south about the same speed, so had the diesel smell to contend with and as we anchored it went down below.  Phil put up the wind scoop and in just a few minutes, the diesel smell was gone.  I fixed sandwiches and fruit for lunch.  After we were settled for a while, Phil and I took a dinghy ride up the river until there was a dam with a nice waterfall, then we turned around to search for the public dock in the hopes to walk into town and some stores. 

Saugerties Lighthouse

We went to the Saugerties Lighthouse and docked there to look around hoping that we could find a place to walk into town.  We spoke to a woman from the area, but she didn't have any recommendations of a public dinghy dock besides to talk to one of the marinas to see if they would let us dock there if we paid.  Phil thought that he had seen one of the boats docked at Waterford, so e hdropped me off at Changes and continued up the river to see if they had anchored past us.  Guess they had turned around and went out to the Hudson River without stopping as Phil didn't see them.  We did see a couple sailboats one being S/V Water Walker docked at one of the marinas on the river, but didn't stop to talk to them.

Back at the Changes, I decided to try using the SunShower, so set it up by the fore hatch to warm.  Phil cooked a good supper last night of fried potatoes, pork chop and green beans.  I cleaned up.  I took my shower as the sun was going down and then Phil took his.  Unfortunately, Phil ran out of water and had to use cool water to rinse his hair.  We are going to pour 1 gallon of water at a time and mark on the bag where they come up to so that I'll be able to put enough water in for both of us.  I think that 2-3 gallons should be good.
It sure felt good to be clean and not sticky!!  The temperature for the night was to be cool, so Phil took the down wind scoop before we went to bed.  Good thing that he did as the night got very cool.  We have had about 3 days of peacefulness and just us, so I hope that when we go to Kingston, NY that there will be some people for me to talk to.

Sunday, September 26
Distance Traveled:  11.1nm
Total Distance Traveled: 507.68 nm

This morning Phil fixed pancakes for breakfast since we had only about 10 nm to go today.  We left at 830am and arrived in Kingston, NY, the former capital of New York, at about 1030am. 
It's an old town and we were able to dock at the Hudson River Maritime Museum.  This is the most expensive place so far at $1.50/ft plus $40 museum membership for us both.  The membership will last for a year, so I'm sure that we'll be docking here on our way back in May to get our money's worth. They do have a shower, water and electric and free wifi and the city dock next door has flush toilets so we are glad to have these amenities.   There was a Freedom 35 that was docked in front of us and later in the day a 96' old William Fife boat built in Scotland called Belle Aventure.  She's a beautiful boat made of wood, built in the early 1900's and is totally, beautifully restored.

Belle Aventure sign

S/V Belle Aventure 96' long

We will be staying here 2 days.  Currently we are on "A" dock, but will have to move to "B" dock as a cruise ship is to dock here tomorrow.  We'll see what tomorrow brings.  Phil and I talked to the owner of Freedom 35 sailboat that was docked in front of us.  This is his first boat and he's grew up close to Manchester, England. Phil has been to Manchester England so they had something to talk about.   He has quite the good accent and lives in New Jersey.  He and the woman he was with came up yesterday evening and have already left this evening to go back home.  After paying for dockage, we walked on a path next to a multi-lane road and came to a convenience store to buy a few groceries.


On the way back we went to Broadway street (which is the downtown part of Kingston) and visited the wine and liquor store and a small whole foods market.  Wouldn't you know they had the Ezekial 4:9 bread that I like and I just finished the loaf we had today so I bought one!  We had sandwiches and fruit for lunch and then went to the Maritime Museum. 

John D. Rockefeller's Ice Boat Icicle

Icicle running board 26' wide

It was a nice museum, had a video about the Hudson River and exhibits of antique ice boats and a video about ice boating on antique stern steerers on the Hudson River.  They also had an exhibit about cutting ice from the river.  We went to the Trolley Museum, but it's under construction and we couldn't find how to get in. 

In between going to museums and taking walks we did a boat chore of letting out all the anchor chain on the dock, stretching it out and measuring the marks Phil had made previously.  He use to have 217' of chain, but he cut 125' off, so the remainder chunk is 92'.  We needed to measure to make sure what we had.  It's easy for Phil to remember that the first mark is 17ft, then 2nd is 25 feet more or 42 feet and then the next mark is another 25 feet or 67ft  and the last 92 feet.  TOO MUCH for me to remember as we are letting out the anchor chain.  So using the BIG Sharpy marker from Virginia that Phil kept on the boat, we marked the 50', 60', 70', 80', and 90'  lengths on the chain.  We were glad to have the permanent marker and will see how long it lasts as we don't have any paint to use.  Then we fed it back in the chain locker using the windlass.

We did go on a longer walk to the other end of the dock and then a round about way to Broadway St coming out close to the wine & liquor store.  Of course we had to buy something.  Then we went back to Changes.  They do have a bus that gets you to the Uptown Kingston area that has a good grocery store, but unfortunately it doesn't run on Sundays.  So the plan is to take the bus to go to the grocery store tomorrow to provision.  They do have a laundromat next to the convenience store, so I'm hoping that we'll be able to take the bus there instead of walking.  Phil's was bragging that he's a senior citizen and can get the $.50 rate instead of $1 that I'll have to pay - and that's one way which we think is not bad.

This evening we had leftovers finishing up the chicken paprika, the green beans and rutabaga. I'm feeling like Mexican food and roast beef so we'll see what we can find at the grocery store tomorrow and see other sites to see.