God Forbid we use our Lectra San - The downside of New York City marinas

[papazulu]

Boy do I miss Boating in NY waters. I've been retired from NYC for 20 years and living in the south bay of San Fran. near the grandkids. One of our favorite things to do would be to launch a kayak or my friends Snipe sailboat from Dobbs Ferry on the Hudson River . The village is afew towns north of NYC. We would sail or kayak over to the Palisades on the New Jersey side of the Hudson. We would beach the boat at the foot of a waterfall coming off of the Palisades(not too well known).A long time ago it was common for NY City folks to come here and use the fresh water to relax in cement pools. The hike up the trail to the top was exciting. A little ways north on the river on the New Jersey side was aVillage called Piermont. It was set back from the Hudson by a swampy bayou of tall marsh reeds. You could get lost in its snaking around to the village. May remind you of the ICW. You are always going to get flotsam and jetsam in any big harbor. Going across the Hudson , besides dodgeing barge traffic you also had to keep an eye out for floating pileings or tree branches.Thinking you can just scoop them up and have much of an effect is like cleaning a beach of seaweed.The next tide deposits just as much. Enjoy NY .I wish I was back there for the Summer. PAPA

[jimmalkin]

Pam - Don't know your plans, but if 79th St is getting to you, you might look at Liberty Landing Marina across the Hudson in Jersey City and at the latitude of the World Financial Center in lower Manhattan. We stay there each year from March - June and Sept to Nov/Dec. The view of Manhattan is terrific, there is a 5 minute ferry ride that leaves every 1/2 hour AND as the marina is on a creek, there is almost no harbor surge. We tried other places up and down the Hudson but the surge ranged from uncomfortable to dangerous. FYI. Oh yeah - they have a pump out boat and a facility at the fuel dock.

[speciald]

How has your Lectrasan been working? I had to replace the electrodes on mine last year at ~$300 and before we left the caribbean the second set seems to be going. We use it all Winter in the islands and not at all in the Cheasapeake during the Summer. Tried rinsing w/ muriatic acid with no improvement.

[CalebD]

PamlicoTraveler,
As a resident of NYC I am glad to hear that you had a good time on your cruise and overnights in the city. You picked a good time to come as the July 4th fireworks are pretty special - I hate to think of how much the show costs but with millions of people to entertain the budget is pretty large. Since I have lived in NYC since my 20's I am a bit blah-zay about fireworks as they seem to shoot them off for any occasion.
I have also traversed Manhattan a few times and have remarked on the number of huge timbers, pilings, tree trunks that seem to be waiting for their moment of fame while holing some cruiser. I am glad to hear that they do some collecting of flotsam but the stuff in the water by your boat is inevitable as the river meets the sea. I keep my 27' sailboat moored about 1/4 mile from shore at Nyack on the Hudson (about 25 nm north of the Battery) and we have had what could only be described as tree trunks hitting our boat in the river.
The sad thing about the Lectra-San is that when we had the northeast regional blackout a few years back they dumped millions of gallons of raw sewage right into the river at 125th street. I know this because my wife and I took a curtailed walk along the river that day in the heat and the smell convinced us to leave.
I have been in the Hudson to swim and to clean my prop from barnacles at Nyack. The water is not really clear and we need more oysters and filter feeders to help clean the silt out of the water. The underwater visibility there was about 1 foot. I guess the same can be said of the Chesapeake estuary since the oyster population has been decimated there as well.
A personal observation on Liberty Landing Marina is that there used to be (and probably still is) a bar right across the creek that would blast loud music well into the night that made that location less than ideal IMHO. I was there on 2 separate weekends and the noise lasted well past midnight. The views from there and the convenience factor are nice though it is not cheap. 79th street sounds like a decent place to stay.

[Pamlicotraveler]

Jimm-We had considered Liberty Landing and it looks great in the pics. We had planned on either that or Staten Island, but ended up choosing the convenience of the 79th. It is a cool place. We did move to a deeper slip by the way/

Specd - We haven't had that trouble with our LS. It has been pretty much trouble free. I have done the muriatic treatment a couple of times, and I use gallons of vinegar, but so far haven't had to replace the electrodes or the blades.

[hellosailor]

Caleb, you'll never get "good" visibility up the Hudson Estuary that way. First, because you are on a tidal estuary, not a river, so everything gets churned up twice a day by the tide. And that includes all the dirt and silt being scoured off the land into the Hudson--which is pretty much the same reason the Mississippi gets called "the big Muddy". You can have pristine pure water--that's dead. Or good water that's just full of algae blooms from nutrient runoff, and silt from the shore. Considering that all the the Catskills are an eroded plateau (not Mountains, no) and all that erosion is going into the Hudson...I suspect one foot of visibility IS good. For there.

[CalebD]

Hellosailor, thanks for the input which all makes sense. I grew up on a harbor off the sound in the 70's and there were probably worse water quality issues into the 80's when there was massive fish kills due to eutrophication (low or now oxygen in the water). The sea gulls and water fowl could not eat all the dead fish lining the shore. The western Sound seems quite a bit better now and I have been swimming in it and can see the bottom through about 8' of depth (which I couldn't as a teenager IIRC).
The Hudson Estuary is newer to me although I have lived by it's mouth in Manhattan for the last 10 years. There have been some hot, hot days that I have just wanted to jump in to cool off if only for a few seconds but there are no beaches anymore in Manhattan.
I was just sailboat racing tonight up at Nyack, NY and there are still fish breaking the surface (I suspect carp) so this is probably a good indication of the water's health as well. The river does not smell bad while sailing on it or once I have jumped in but it is a little creepy to think that there is a nuke plant warming up the water and my memories of effluent going out with the tide in the last big regional blackout. So sad.
I believe that there are some communities that still rely on the Hudson for their drinking water as well. Are you with the Riverkeeper organization? I miss Robert Gainer's helpful advice and would consider helping out.
Catskills not mountains? It is true. NY has some interesting geology.
Barnacles on my prop are another indicator that the water is pretty healthy.
All the best.