Sights along the Hudson River

For a minute, I thought I was in New Orleans!

We were ready to get underway early on June 10 on our last leg northbound, but we decided to wait until 1330 for a flood tide on the river to give us a boost from the tail current.  In planning our travel up the Hudson, I found that there are 4-5’ tides from NYC all the way past Albany to the Federal Lock at Troy.  This will create currents along the river up to 2 mph, which can be either with you or against you.  My boat already burns enough fuel, so we chose the tail current whenever possible.

 

We could almost set our watches to the Amtrack train

We took our time heading north, and anchored two nights along the last 100 miles to Waterford NY.  One anchorage was nice & quiet, except for the hourly Amtrack train running right along the river from NYC northbound.  I was surprised at how few other boats were on the river, since I knew that many other “Loopers” were headed north by this time.  In fact, we saw a fellow “Looper” tied up at a marina that we passed, whom we had docked next to at both Cape May NJ as well as Staten Island NY.  We called them on the VHF radio to say “hi”.

USMA at West Point.  GO NAVY!!

Some resemblance to the Tennessee River

Culinary Institute of America from the River.  YUM!

Bannerman's Castle.  There's a story here somewhere!

A big surprise as we round a corner of the river.
These big guys travel as far upriver as Albany.

Finally!  The Troy Federal Lock!

Then on June 12, we finally saw the place for which we had been searching for about the last two years……the Troy Federal Lock.  This meant the end (finally) to salt water and its tides and currents.  No more 2+ mph currents swinging us at anchor every 6 hours around our anchor rode (and horribly twisting the trip line around the rode), and no more timing the 8’ tides to determine whether you’ll make it through the shoaling along the ICW.  From now until sometime in November when we get back south to Mobile Bay, we’ll be in fresh water with no tides.

At Waterford NY, the Hudson River meets the Erie Canal
and the Champlain Canal

But instead of tides, we get to worry about our height clearances passing under all the bridges crossing the Erie & Oswego Canals.  Just prior to the C-1 Lock (the first one on the Champlain Canal), we barely made it under a bridge which was charted at 22’ clearance, but was really about 19.8’, and we cleared by about 4 inches.  We’ll have to pass back under that bridge next week when we leave to begin the Erie Canal westward, and hope that we don’t have much rain between now & then.

 

We’re staying for a week at a marina close to my sister-in-law Cindy.  We’ll visit a lot, eat a lot of her excellent lasagna, and get caught up on chores on the boat.  Sue will spend most of the week back in Tennessee taking care of her mother.  Then we’ll re-stock provisions, do some trip planning, and head west, eventually to Chicago.