Tuesday, April 22nd to Wednesday, April 23rd
Haverstraw, NY to Castleton-on-Hudson
Tuesday, April 22nd
Slept in this morning to almost 8 AM... did engine room checks and we departed after leaving message for marina that we would not need to have them haul the boat. Yippee! No wind, but heavy fog, light misting rain and lots of floating stuff in the river... what a combination. Marie and Mickey took turns reaching out with towels and wiping off the plastic windshield in front of me about every 2 minutes while I squinted dead ahead looking for flotsam and we inched along at about 6 knots (sailboat speed). Our track weaving around the floating debris looked like a drunkard's but I think we survived the day without chopping any wood. The Hudson seems to have the most interesting floating junk: tires, floating barrels, various & sundry styrofoam objects, balloons, dimension lumber, telephone poles, railroad ties, and the usual tree parts from small branches to whole trunks. This stuff tends to collect in the slower water at the inside of the river bends, just where we'd like to go to shorten the route, but for most of the day we had to take the long route out in the faster current where we would burn more fuel, but minimize the probability of prop damage.
Fog lifted and it began to clear by the time we passed under the Bear Mountain Bridge and headed for West Point. The rest of the day was free of rain and with good visibility so we were able to enjoy the beauty of the Hudson Highlands as Marie read the guidebook description of each mansion, monastery, mill or other historical site.
Arrived at the mouth of Catskill Creek a little after 4:30, having gone 74 miles, and were tied up at Hop-O-Nose Marina by 5 PM. Of the 3 or 4 marinas in Catskill Creek, Hop-O-Nose is the only one with its docks in at this point in the season. All in all a pretty uneventful day compared to yesterday.
Wednesday, April 23rd
Our last day on the boat... up at around 8 AM... cold front came through after midnight and dropped the temperature about 20 degrees. Departed from Catskill around 9 AM for a leisurely 25-mile trip to our final destination at Castleton Boat Club, just south of Albany. Castleton was the location of the two classes and exams I took for my USCG Captain's License and upgrade to 50 Ton Master.
We are on the dock at Castleton BC by 11:35 AM and having beers at their friendly bar by 11:45. We check in with Ron, the steward / bar tender and he offers us a special rate of $25/day for Golden's stay on their docks which will extend to May 4th when the locks open and Mike and Paige can complete the trip to Lake Champlain. Capt. Tom Swank, who teaches the Captain's course for Sea School and is past CBC Commodore and its current dock master, arrives for a reunion. He owns a Marine Trader 34 single screw trawler and is anxious to get a tour of Golden. Tom is the only paraplegic ever granted a captain's license by the US Coast Guard and after wheeling himself down the dock to Golden's location, he hoists himself aboard and using handholds and impressive upper body strength moves freely around the boat. Mike arrives at 4 PM...we load up the Jeep, check Golden one last time and head for home in Vermont where I look forward to sleeping in a non-rocking bed for the first time in two and a half weeks.
