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September 19th, Monday - Sea Cliff, New York
We had our first man
overboard drill today! Before you panic, I'll say
that we were safely attached to a mooring at the time of
the incident. My money has always been on Juliana
to be the first accident on the boat, and my bet paid
off today, although it was hardly her fault. She
was leaning out over the lifelines, dramatically
spitting out the taste of her hated chewable vitamin,
and the gate clasp came undone and into the water she
fell! Joe and I both heard the clatter of the
lifelines. We looked at each other; "what was
that?" and rushed outside. Two seconds later the
whole anchorage was treated to a blood curdling scream
let forth by our youngest child! She was totally
freaked out, but managed to conquer her panic enough to
swim to the back step and use the ladder to climb back
on board. We quickly determined that
she was completely unharmed, in all but her ego.
Although it took her quite a while to recover from the
fright and the embarrassment, once she did she was able
to joke about it. She even relayed the story
to the dock hand at the yacht club. It is a
sobering fact that we might not have heard her if we had
been underway. The ambient noise, either sailing
or motoring, is high enough to cover the lifeline
clatter and her scream would have been well behind us by
the time she surfaced. It reinforces our rule that
no kids are allowed out of the cockpit while we
are underway without direct supervision.
We had a day of
torrential rain in Northport on Thursday. After
school, we made it into town to check things out.
Sitting at Tim's Shipwreck Diner for lunch, we soon
discovered that Main Street was knee deep in rushing
water. It was amazing to see it surging past the
wheel wells of the cars parked along the curb.
Main Street is built along the valley that leads down to
the port so it isn't surprising that constant rainfall
produces such heavy flooding. The locals all
calmly walked out the back door (who knew there was a
back door?) while we gaped at the sight out the front.
The waitress grabbed a framed picture off the wall
depicting a guy rowing by the front of the diner in a
canoe during a much earlier flood. We spent the
next couple of hours at the library, just trying to stay
dry. No movie theaters or malls were close by, so
it was our best option. The rain finally let up by
the time we were ready to leave and we managed to get
some good playing in at a playground on the walk home.
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We made our way to Sea
Cliff, Long Island on Friday and picked up a mooring at
the Sea Cliff Yacht Club. A very nice yacht club,
not the usual blue blazer crowd, that allowed us to take
advantage of a full size pool, showers and a nice
clubhouse. I have a friend from high school,
Adriana LoRusso-Vitale, who lives with her husband, Tom
and their two kids in Glen Cove, right around the
corner. We had planned on spending the weekend
with them. We quickly took advantage of their
laundry facilities and general hospitality and wound up
spending Friday and Saturday night at their house.
Their daughter, Aria, is 10 and was so entertaining for
the girls to hang out with. Of course, Tristan, 8,
provided plenty of diversion as well. I suspect it
was he who started the pillow fights! We got to
see Tristan start the second half of their little league
football game as quarterback on Sunday. The game
was supposed to be Saturday, but the wet weather
continued throughout the whole day both Friday and
Saturday, so it was rescheduled. It was great for
us to have a place to hang. It gets quite cramped
and boring inside the boat during wet weather.
Plus, we had a great time getting reacquainted with
Adriana and getting to know Tom and the kids. They
treated us like royalty with breakfasts and fabulous
dinners each night. Not to miss out completely on
the touring opportunities, we visited Sagamor Hill,
Teddy Roosevelt's farm and estate. We would have liked to take
them sailing on Sunday, but kid birthday parties and
football games got in the way. We had to settle
for dinner, a sunset and a moonrise on Zia for our last
night with the Vitales.
Our departure for New
York City is timed for 9 am tomorrow. It is
recommended that you pass through the famous Hell Gate
just before slack tide in order to avoid the worst of
the currents that give the narrow passage its
intimidating name. We have heard rumors that the
79th Street Boat Basin has something of a problem with
cockroaches on its docks, so we are going to opt for a
mooring instead. That way, we don't have to tie up
to the dock and risk an infestation. We'll have to
spray our dinghy lines with something lethal to keep
them off that. We've arranged a spot across the Hudson
at Newport Marina for the weekend. Our friends
Bruce and Alison are coming up with Holly for Saturday
and Sunday and we want to make sure the accommodations
are adequate! Dock space is pricey in the
Manhattan area, so we'll risk 79th Street for the first
part of our stay in New York, unless it is really bad.
Only 10 more days or so before we are back in Annapolis!
I'm amazed at how quickly this leg of our journey has
gone by.
Christy, Joe, Cassie and Juliana
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Many thanks to our
friend Craig Homenko for his assistance in setting up
the website.
We also would like
to thank our buddy Scott Brunner who has been kind
enough to host the website on his server.
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