Today is an exciting day, we will be sailing right through Manhattan and New York City! We have already been told by others to expect some busy traffic in the area with ferries, other boats, commercial traffic, etc. We will see what we get today and what the day has in store.

We left our anchorage around 6:30 am this morning. A couple of boat that were in the same anchorage as us had already left this morning by the time we were pulling up anchor. It looks like it will be a beautiful day for heading down the Hudson. We have a couple of bridges to go under today, however they are all have a large amount of clearance for us to get under them without an issue. First up is the Tappan Zee Bridge.

The landscape between bridges featured The Palisades, cliffs that rise up from the river to a height of over 500 feet.

After we passed the Palisades we could see our first glimpses of NYC with the George Washington bridge in the foreground.

Curiously, we began to encounter some commercial traffic, however the large ships we encountered were all anchored just outside of the middle of the channel. At the time we were passing through, we were fighting a flood current that was going up river and we were guessing these guys anchor and wait for the tide to turn and then keep on their way down the river when they have a favorable current. This is good news for us since all the commercial traffic seems to be standing still for now.

We came under the George Washington bridge and inched our way closer to the city.

Next we passed by the upper west side of NYC. This is where Park Ave is and the richer half live. You can’t necessarily see it in the picture but on the other side of the penthouse apartments is Central Park.

Here’s an even fancier part of the upper west side.

There are even big cruise ships at the port in Manhattan. The small sailboat in the picture gives you a pretty good sense of scale with the cruise ship and buildings.

Up next was a very cool looking building that looks like a sailboat. I learned that it is actually a residential building called 57 West.

Next up was a pretty good shot of the Empire State Building

Then we passed right over the Lincoln Tunnel. It’s weird to think that cars are going through a tunnel under the river and our boat heading down the river. Here is the entrance on the New York side that is visible above ground.

Next up is a unique structure called The Vessel. It was designed as an interactive sculpture. It is designed to be climbed and toured. Each of the interwoven sides of the vessel are actually stairways and landings. 154 flights of stairs, 80 landings and over 2,500 steps.

Next up was this unique green space that was built on stilts over the water in a terraced fashion to house a park and amphitheater. It is called Little Island Park.

The only picture I took of the New Jersey side of the river included a photo of this sculpture called “Water’s Soul” It depicts a woman with a finger to her pursed lips to signal quiet. The meaning of the sculpture is paying homage to the water. It invites people to be silent…to try to listen to their own thoughts, their own dreams, their own ideas in this incredibly time today in which we live. How very symbolic since this is exactly what we are doing about Painkiller.

Then we passed over the Holland Tunnel.

Next up was the heart of the financial district, One World Trade Center and the Battery at the end of Manhattan. One World Trade is the tallest building in the picture below.

Now we have officially left the Hudson River behind us and we are in the inner harbor of New York. Of to our right hand side is Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. The East River is off to our left hand side where you can see the Brooklyn Bridge, Wall Street and the United Nations building. It was rather interesting to hear the Coast Guard calling Securite warnings all morning about restrictions to navigation up and down the East River today due to various world leaders currently meeting at the U.N. building.

Here is Ellis Island

And here is Lady Liberty! I honestly thought that the Statue of Liberty would be bigger than it really is. It seemed small compared to all the skyscrapers in the city.

Then we decided to put the boat on autopilot and looked to ensure we wouldn’t bump into anyone hovering around the statue. Mark and I came along side the boat and turned so we could get a selfie of us in front of the statue of liberty.

Here is a photo looking up the East River with a nice view of the Brooklyn Bridge.

After our little tour of the inner harbor, we passed under the Verrazzano Narrows bridge that defines the inner harbor from the outer harbor and connects NYC to Staten Island.

We are heading to Great Kills Yacht Club on Staten Island to spend the next several days while we wait for our friend Tim to join us for our next leg of our journey. In the meantime, we celebrated our 33rd wedding anniversary today! The greatest gift was the spectacular views of New York from our boat on the Hudson River and the harbor. We ended the day with a fabulous dinner on Staten Island!