New York, NY

Arriving in New York City after spending a month in sleepy Cape Cod was a bit of a shock to our systems. Fortunately we were able to ease into it a bit by anchoring in Port Washington, which is just outside of the vortex of downtown.  Port Washington is probably the most boater-friendly anchorage we have encountered.

 

The city provides free Wi-Fi and there is a major grocery store, laundromat, hardware store, and West Marine within quick walking distance of the town dinghy dock. And bonus: Manhattan is an easy 40-minute train ride. We spent a relaxing first full day in Central Park with my parents, who drove here from Chicago to visit us, and aunt, uncle and cousins that I haven't seen in decades. The boys got to meet and spend some time with another young cousin.

 

We have visited Manhattan many times but adding live-aboard kids to the mix makes it a very different experience. We spent one very long day walking several miles and the kids held it together fairly well, only uttering, "I'm tired," a couple dozen times (believe me, that is pretty good). At one point, as we were walking along the bustling sidewalk near Times Square, Matt felt a hand brush his and instinctively grabbed it, assuming it was one of the kids. The stranger whose hand it actually was, jerked back just as Matt realized the mistake. That man is probably telling people the story of the weirdo that tried to hold his hand.

 

 

 

 

 

With all the goodies that my parents brought with them (including the most delicious marinated pork loin ever) and all the shopping we have been able to do with the use of their car, our food storage lockers are fuller than they have ever been. The only place we've been able to find some space are the shelves in Mark and Conrad's heads. I hope those wrappers are air tight to keep out the poop molecules. In any case, our boat is the place to be when the zombie apocalypse happens.

 

We're planning to leave Port Washington on Sunday to keep heading south. Hopefully we'll avoid any issues with transiting the East River while the UN is in session.  We've read that part of the river gets closed down, but we can't seem to find any schedule for when they might do it.  Apparently it's on a whim.  After Cape May and Delaware Bay, we'll be poking around the Chesapeake for a bit while we wait for the height of hurricane season to pass.

Copps Harbor (Norwalk Islands)