A GRAY CLOUDY DAY

Today was an easy day, I only had to travel 54 nautical miles.  It was a boring day, last night and early this morning it rained so we left a little later.  As we pulled out of Rondout Creek, Carol took a picture of the Rondout lighthouse.  The Rondout Creek is part of the remains of the Delaware and Hudson Canal which was built to transport coal from Pennsylvania to New York via barge.  The City of Kingston, like many other cities on the Hudson, was very wealthy and the buildings that remain show it.  As you can see from the picture the sky was gray with big dark clouds.  We had rain almost all day and the wind was coming straight down the river right on my bow.  But I pushed on and got us to Troy by mid afternoon.

This Lazzara express yacht did a slow pass and then opened up after she went by.  She was 96 feet long, sleek and beautiful.  When we got to Troy the Lazzara was at the dock taking on 1,000 gallons of fuel.  Rich had to guide me against the dock just in front of her fighting the current and the wind.  I heard Rich say something about having to go change his underwear.  Rich, Carol and a dockhand got me against the dock and tied down without incident

My friend BlueSkies was also in the marina before we got there.  We will part company tomorrow as BlueSkies is heading up through Lake Champlain and I am going out the Erie Canal.

Because of the gray skies and rain, today was not a good day for taking pictures.  Carol did get one almost good picture of the Saugerties Lighthouse.  Just past the lighthouse I looked up and saw a formation of geese in a perfect “V” flying south.  It felt cold with the wind and rain.It was no wonder the geese were heading south.  I was going north I thought there was something wrong.

Troy is a depressed city but its buildings that were erected in the later 19th century show how much money and what a thriving city it was.  Troy was also the city where Uncle Sam was created.  Sam Wilson a local meat packer packed beef for the Army during the War of 1812.  He stamped the beef with his initials and "U.S. Beef" later a caricature of him became the Uncle Sam we know today. There is a statute of him in the city----Rich and Carol did not have their camera with them so I can’t post a picture.