Day #332 – New York City, NY

This old lightship is permanently docked at our marina and used as offices, rest rooms and showers.  It even has an ATM inside.  Its original function was to be a movable lighthouse and used where needed.

And look who arrived this morning into New York Harbor, Salvage Crew.

We were there to meet them not only with the camera, but open arms.  So glad they are repaired and underway again.

Andy and I took the water taxi back over to Manhattan at 11:00.  Today we were to do the Uptown Manhattan tour.  The route was altered several times today because the “Gay Pride” parade was going down 5th Avenue all day.  Fun to watch but certainly congested traffic in an already congested city.

We passed the infamous Waldorf Astoria.  At this time it is home to Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.

And a few more of the recognizable sites we saw were Rockefeller Center…

The Rainbow Room…

Radio City Music Hall…

Time Warner Building…

and a famous deli.

Our tour took us up Broadway overlooking Central Park the entire distance.

Some other sites included the Trump Building globe outside of Trump Towers…

and many other high end residences including The Dakota where John Lennon lived.

There were many beautiful churches along the tour today.

as well as museums.

An interesting part of the trip took us through Harlem.  This particular bridge has been used in many movie chase scenes.

And of course the infamous Apollo Theater.  Many people had gathered outside to sing and dance and celebrate the life of Michael Jackson which ended so suddenly last week.

After leaving Harlem we traveled down Fifth Avenue past many spectacular homes and finally the Plaza Hotel.

These were a couple of sights that we found interesting…

a policeman texting…

storing in sin?…

a high-end CVS…

and lastly, ahhh home.

We ended another wonderful day in New York Harbor with dinner aboard Salvage Crew.  Life is good!

Day #331 – New York City, NY

Last night we took the water taxi from the marina across the river to Jersey City, NJ for dinner.

Fortunately, we were inside the restaurant just as the storm hit.  We had a great time, but even more impressive was the cloud formation we were treated to on the way back.  This type of cloud is called mammatus.  We had never seen them before and they were amazing.

We sat on the flybridge of the boat after we got back and watched the city come alive at night.  What a site.

This morning we were back on the water taxi and headed across the Hudson River

for Lower Manhattan.  They drop you off in The Battery.  It was a perfect day for sightseeing as it was sunny, breezy and 82 degrees.

We stopped at the NYC Police Memorial.  It really took your breath away to see all of the names from September 11, 2001.

As we made our way to Battery Park there were neighborhood gardens everywhere as well as dog parks and playgrounds.  Local residents maintain little areas within each garden.

At Battery Park we started our double-decker bus tour of Lower Manhattan.  I will attempt to highlight some of the areas we saw.

Chinatown…

Chrysler Building (with the spire)…

Central Park South…

Carnegie Hall…

Part of the Theater District…

Note what looks like little Academy Award statues lined up in the window…

Times Square…

Note the crystal ball that drops on New Year’s Eve…

New York City Post Office…

The Empire State Building…

Macy’s which happens to have 2.2 million square feet…

The Flat Iron Building…

New York Supreme Court Building where “Law and Order” is filmed…

The Seaport District…

The Brooklyn Bridge…

A walk up Wall Street…

And last but not least, the somber site of the World Trade Center…

By order of the Port Authority you were not allowed to take pictures above or below the fence and not between the gates.

It was extremely moving and we plan to return tomorrow and take the personally guided tour of the Visitor Center.

There are also just a few assorted pictures that I thought were worth sharing.

Second runner up…a bride and groom seated mid-day across from the New York Stock Exchange????

First runner up…a gentleman hangs from the hooks on this top of this building and paints a new sign every couple of months.

And the winner is…

A fellow boater was kind enough to take a picture of Good News cruising in front of the Statue of Liberty yesterday and email it to us…priceless.

Day #330 – New York City, NY

We thought this was a funny sign at the marina boat ramp.  Guess they get their point across.

It just didn’t feel right this morning at 7:00 as we left Manasquan…without Salvage Crew.

They need further repairs to their exhaust system and will find out later today when the fix can be made.  The conditions for our last day out on the ocean were perfect so we made the decision to head to New York City and wait for them on the other side.

It was a calm day on the water with just rollers and no real waves, very comfortable.  Unfortunately, the skies were cloudy and there was a fair amount of haze which made visibility tough.

We crossed from the North Atlantic Ocean into Long Island Sound at 9:30.  We have officially completed our time on the Atlantic Ocean and glad to report we are no worse for the wear.  Immediately we picked up about two miles per hour with the current.

The sights of the city began to come into view through the haze.

The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge comes into view.  The commercial ship traffic does as well.

It is hard to believe that we are sitting in front of the Statue of Liberty on our own boat.  What a dream come true.

As we sat in front of the statue we played the National Anthem and again realized how proud we are to be Americans.  Note the people standing at the bottom of the picture to get a perspective on the size of the statue.

The Staten Island Ferry passes in front of us.  Water taxis are everywhere.

Ellis Island is off our port side.

As we head up the Hudson River

we pass this yacht named Le Grand Bleu, a 370 foot mega yacht.

Note in the picture it has a 74-foot sailboat and a 67-foot speedboat stored behind the sailboat on her aft deck.  She also makes room for a helicopter, a life boat and has a crew of 50.

In 2002, Le Grande Bleu was sold to Russian billionaire and owner of Chelsea Football Club Roman Abramovich. In 2006, Roman Abramovich presented her as a gift to old friend Eugene Shvidler, an asset-management and one-time oil Russian billionaire.   Nice friend.  It is currently the 10th largest yacht in the world.

We pulled into Liberty Landing Marina.  This is the view off the bow of Good News.

This is the view out of our starboard pilot house door.

There is so much to see and do we are a bit overwhelmed.  Time to get on the water taxi and go exploring.  We still can’t believe we are in New York City.