belly of the beast
We emerged from the cozy familiarity of Narragansett Bay at Point Judith, and had a lovely reach all day past Rhode Island and into Connecticut, headed toward the Thimble Islands. Tim’s friend Doug Logan told him to reach out when we were passing Sachem’s Head, and he zipped out in his Boston Whaler, led us to a sweet spot by Bear Island at which to anchor, came aboard and charmed us all. He told us some local history, including that some of the pinky-peach granite from that corner of the world had been used to build the base of the Statue of Liberty.
Doug leads the way.
The next day we picked up the same reaching breeze to continue our progress down Long Island Sound and onto a mooring at The City Island Yacht Club. Dubbed the Bronx Riviera by my cousin, Scott Perrin, City Island is spangled with neon-signed seafood restaurants at which you might imagine Paulie Walnuts wining and dining his Goomah. In the history of American sailing, City Island was The center of American sailing from the 1920s through the 50s. The great yachts of that era were built at Minneford’s, Nevins, and Jacobs boatyards. In 1929, Olin Stevens built Dorade at Minneford’s, revolutionizing yacht design.
No sooner had our dinghy hit the water than Tim’s daughter Kate arrived to catch a sweet visit with her grandparents before they headed back home the following day. Tom and Sue had acted as Billy Pilgrim’s midwives, accompanying us all the way from Gloucester, helping us troubleshoot and giving useful advice from all of the nautical miles under their collective belt.
Saturday was sparkling, and Cousin Scott and his partner Antonia Lanzi treated us to a phenomenal trip down the East River, under 6 bridges, around the tip of Manhattan to Chelsea Piers, and out into New York Harbor. We were joined on Scotts’s Stephens 68 (Great Scott) by Katy and her boyfriend Kai, my daughter Emma doing her best Kennedy impersonation, and some of Scott and Antonia’s friends. The waters were abuzz with all manner of vessels: ferries; water taxis; cigarette boats; a prison barge; a swimming pool barge; schooners; sewage boats; tugboats; houseboats; kayaks; jet skis; and even a sister ship to Billy Pilgrim - Passport 40 hull number 148 to our 141, named Water Music (which happens to be a previous name of Billy Pilgrim). Traveling this water, I kept thinking of my friend Martha Wood who SWAM around Manhattan in August —an impressive feat that’s hard to fathom. Scott shared a wealth of remarkable New York City facts, and Antonia was equally generous with a delicious spread of things to eat and drink.
We were not directly in the crush of humanity as we gazed at Manhattan and the boroughs from the water, but the vastness of the place is absolutely mind boggling. We saw maybe a dozen weddings on this first Saturday of October. More windows on more buildings than it’s possible to count. Emma’s subway line, the Q clanked over us on the Manhattan bridge, we bobbed over the Holland tunnel under the Hudson, helicopters buzzed above our heads. Busy busy world.
The culmination of our Gotham City excursion was a circumnavigation of the Statue of Liberty, gold torch gleaming in the sunshine, a wistful look on her mannish face as she surveyed where we’d been and where we’re going from her pedestal of Thimble island granite.
—Lesley
