Got on the water just before sunrise today after a night of being woken up several times by trains blaring their whistles fifteen feet from where we were sleeping. We met up with a friend I got to know in planning this trip, Bill Quick. He was pivotal in planning the Erie Canal and Hudson river portions of this trip, as he is experienced in paddling both waterways and gave us a lot of good advice during the planning process. We passed a really neat old castle as well as some beautiful mountains that rose directly up from the riverbanks. It felt like we had our own personal tour guide as we paddled from Newburgh to Cold Spring with Bill. He pointed out all of the features of the area, giving us detailed history and other interesting background information. He's even writing a guide-style book on the Hudson that sounds like it will be pretty awesome when it's finished.
After lunch at Cold Spring, Jay and I decided to take advantage of the steady wind at our backs, so we attached the boats and put up the sail. We even had an audience as we did so. Some day trip kayakers were very interested in Boldy and watched the whole process involved in getting the boats hooked up and underway. We bid farewell to Bill and then let the wind do the work for a bit. A couple of guys on jetskis provided us with the title of this post. They were staring at us for a while, probably trying to figure out what we were as we sailed towards them just before we passed West Point.
The wind died down just as we got to the bridge at Bear Mountain, so we unhooked the boats and paddled the rest of the way to our campsite for the night at Croton Point. It's a beautiful evening looking out over Haverstraw Bay, and if we look south we can see the Tappan Zee bridge in the distance. We'll be paddling under it tomorrow on our way to Yonkers, our next destination.
~Shannon
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