Up the Hudson
May 17, 2025
Yesterday we got off the boat without Heidi and walked about town. Stopped for a late lunch and meandered our way to a grocery store to provision for fresh produce. This morning, we got off the boat again, this time taking Heidi with us. We met several men at the docks and chatted with them; they had suggestions as to where to eat breakfast and were interested in our plans to travel the Great Loop. After an enjoyable breakfast outside at The Foundry, we walked to the Episcopal Church of St. Mary’s in the Highlands to the craft fair. After perusing the tents, we strolled a few of the side streets of downtown and talked to several locals. Heidi enjoyed her walk and got to meet other dogs. Stopped and picked up a croissant each and had them for lunch with yogurt, honey, fresh fruit & walnuts – yum! We got back to the boat just before the heavens opened for all of 5 minutes and now the sun is pushing through; muggy day. Now that the rain has ended, it’s a good time to wipe down the outside of the boat & clean the windows. On either side of the Hudson, where we are anchored, there is a frequent rumble of diesel engines from the trains. One side is all freight trains with unbelievably long line of freight cars. Some of the freight trains were two container high – what a site!
The other side of the Hudson is the commuter trains.
We listen to them all day long, but we don’t mind; Lauren actually enjoys listening to them especially when they sound their horns. One of her wishes is to someday take a lengthy train trip to who knows where – lol..
On our stroll back to the boat this morning, Lauren actually bought a sun dress. For those who know her, she despises clothes shopping. She actually wore it out to dinner at Cathryn’s Tuscan Grill. We had a wonderful meal; this was our first “dress up” meal out since we started our journey. It was good to splurge; worth it when the food is great! The dinghy ride back to the boat was nice and calm and Heidi greeted us enthusiastically. While we were on anchor, two bald eagles landed on rock outcrop near us. Pretty awesome to see.
After securing the dinghy and putting away the life jackets, we played a game of Skip-Bo. While we were playing, the winds whipped up and started howling; the gusts were up to 31mph, maybe more since we are in a valley. The winds were shrieking, and boat was moving like it was on ice (thankfully, no rocking) and Heidi was freaking out; poor thing. Just glad the winds didn’t pick up til we were back on board. Brian, of course, won again. He’s lucky at this game.
Tomorrow, we pull anchor and travel to Poughkeepsie and anchor for one or two nights. We may check out the Vanderbilt Mansion National Historic Site.
May 17, 2025
Pulled up anchor at Cold Spring . As we did, the ball marking the trip line floated off into shallow water. The action of all the tide changes, current and high winds had chaffed through the line that held it to the anchor. We have a spare in the locker containing all of the ground tackle which we can use in the future. After getting the anchor up we motored to just north of Poughkeepsie in an anchorage at Hyde Park. The winds were whipping and pushing our boat around making it a bit more challenging getting the anchor set. The Vanderbilt Mansion is not open to the public tomorrow, so instead of sitting here on the anchor another whole day, we will head to Athens so we can get off the boat and walk around. We got the dominoes out and tried to play the Mexican Train version. Even though we had instructions, it was still a bit contentious between us interpreting them. We think we finally figured it out. Would like to pick up a travel Scrabble game and definitely need a new deck of Skip-Bo cards.
May 19, 2025
Traveled about 5 hours with winds and tides against us to Athens. Passed two barges; one with all shredded junk metal and the other a concrete hauler. Both yesterday and today, there were numerous fishing boats out and about; we were wondering if there was a tournament or maybe striper season? Once anchored, we decided to stay for one night and move on to Albany tomorrow and spend a few days there touring the city. We did take a walk around Athens. Only one eatery open; split a chicken parm sandwich and a bottle of cream soda. There are quite a few empty store fronts. It was good to stretch our legs.
Brian reading: Storm Prey by John Sanford
Lauren: A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn
Hope all is well and stay safe out there.