Kingston New York – Rondout Yacht Basin (Port #104) ; Jul 10,11

Jul 10 – Tue
After 1 week at The Half Moon Bay Marina at Croton on the Hudson, we traveled 54 miles to The Rondout Yacht Basin at Kingston New York.

Kingston is about 100 miles north of New York City, and is about 65 miles south of The Erie Canal.

The ride up The Hudson was beautiful.
The team was in good spirits on this beautiful, sunny, travel day.

The Hudson is lined with beautiful tree-lined hills, there are railroad trains tooting their horns on both sides of the river, and  there are many very tall bridges (160 ft clearance).

We passed several of the places we had visited by land ; West Point, The Culinary Institute, and The Walkway Bridge over the Hudson (where we had watched the fireworks).

We passed by a place that Dave Googled and learned that it was called the Indian Point Nuclear Energy Plant.

We also passed some nice little lighthouses, and The Bannerman Castle – a retired military warehouse.

We arrived at the Rondout Yacht Basin in Kingston New York about 1:30pm.
It was a very hot day, so we started our visit with a couple of hours in the Yacht Basin Pool.
The Rondout Yacht Basin is not much to look at, but they have a great pool, including shading screens above the pool. We met with relatively new Loopers (Ellen & Kim), and talked for a while with a local Kingston lady named Ronnie.

After the pool, Dave & I washed the boat & dropped the dinghy into the water.
We took the dinghy across the Rondout Creek Canal to dinner at The Old Savannah Restaurant. Dinner lasted well into the night.

It was a wonderful 1st day in Kingston.
Tomorrow – Sight Seeing in Kingston New York  !

Jul 11 – Wed
On Wednesday we again took the dinghy across the Rondout Creek Canal into downtown Kingston.

The Uber quote was $12 one way just to get across the river, so the dinghy definitely came in handy in this town, saving $24 each trip. It was about a 10 minute dinghy ride.

We started the day at The Hudson River Maritime Museum.
When we arrived, there was a rowing school right next to the museum, in process of teaching new students.

The Museum had a host of interesting topics;
> The 1st room contained MANY models of Historic Miniature Wooden Boats. They had photos & bio’s of all the model makers, all a bunch of elderly gentlemen, with the most prevalent being a ole fella named Charlie Niles.

> There was a room dedicated to New York Governor DeWitt Clinton, and his endeavours to create the Erie Canal & link it to The Hudson River.
Clinton was largely responsible for the construction of the Erie Canal.
He was persuaded by Canal proponent Jesse Hawley to support construction of a canal from the eastern shore of Lake Erie to the upper Hudson River.
When first built, the Erie Canal cut transportation costs by a whopping 95%. The contribution of the canal to the worth of the New York region is incalculable.

Upon completion of the canal, it was fact that DeWitt Clinton & dignitaries led the opening ceremonies for the Erie Canal and rode a canal boat named the Seneca Chief from Buffalo New York to New York City, with two flasks of Lake Erie fresh water. They poured the two flasks of Lake Erie fresh water into the New York Harbor, symbolically connecting the two bodies of water forever.

> There was a room dedicated to The Erie Canal – videos of how the locks work, and even photos of the early days when horses would be used to pull boats thru the locks (all sailing vessels at that time). There were also wooden models of the locks.
We will begin the Erie Canal adventure on Sunday.

> The next room was dedicated to Steamships that once traveled the Hudson River.
The most famous being The Mary Powell & The Alexander Hamilton.
There was a large steering wheel which actually came from the Alexander Hamilton on display, it was used in the event of a failure in the main steering. The notes said that the steering wheel is so large to provide assisted torque for the heavy rudders, but it still took 4 men to spin it.
There were also a few displays showing how a steam engine works.

> There were rooms dedicated to ;
* Restoring the Hudson from Pollution and renewed fish populations.
* Hurricanes & Flooding Histories of the Hudson & tributaries like Rondout.
* Jobs created by The Hudson River – Cement, Bricks, Fishing

> There was a very interesting exhibit on Ice Boat Racing.
The material suggested that even back as far as the 1800’s there were ice racing boats that could do as much as 90-100 mph with only a 25mph wind (4:1 ratio), making them the fastest vehicles on earth in 1800s.
There are records of an 83-year-old guy named Chuck Nevitt, who doesn’t look like the fastest man on earth, but many believe that in February 1947 Nevitt set a record as the world’s fastest naturally powered human during a remarkable iceboat sail across the flat, black ice of Lake Winnebago.
Stopwatch-clutching spectators gazed slack-jawed as the Coast Guard veteran piloted his 42-foot Flying Dutchmen between two buoys set two miles apart. It took 53 seconds, and that included a tack he made in the middle of the course that added about a quarter-mile to the distance.
“They figured somewhere in there I was doing 150 mph. Maybe 155,” Nevitt said.
That would definitely shorten the time required to complete The Loop.
Google searches show that there is currently no Guinness World record for this topic.

 

After the Maritime Museum, we went to lunch at The Mariners Harbor Restaurant.

After lunch, we went for a stroll around town. We attempted to go to The Trolley Museum but it was only open on the weekend.

The highlight of the day was probably our afternoon dinghy ride to the local swimming hole on the Rondout Creek Canal.

On the way to the swimming hole, we saw some tug boats being worked on. They were up out of the water on a barge that looked like they drove into, then lifted the boat out of the water to work on it.
The tug below looked like it was a new boat, or had just received a major cleaning & a new set of running gear (shafts, props, and shrouds).

After swimming in the creek, we came back to Gettin’ Looped, got some quick showers, and headed out for a Mexican Dinner at a place called The Pier 23 Mole-Mole’. Wednesday was $3 Margareta night !

It was an early nite to bed, tomorrow we had another 55 miles from Kingston to Albany New York !