Huntington, Long Island

Alia Vita
Rob & Frances Lythgoe
Sat 6 Jun 2015 20:16
40:53.78N  73:25.43W

We left the hustle and bustle of the big city and headed up the north shore of Long Island. Whilst this is still New York state, we might as well be in a different country. We could DEFINITELY live here! How many times are we going to say that on this trip I wonder? So far on our various travels it has only been applied to Vancouver and Bermuda I think, but I'm still holding out a lot of hope for some remote South Pacific island.  Affordability might be a slight issue here, we picked up the Estates freebie at the supermarket and the houses we like all seem to be over the $5,000,000 dollar mark. Oh well.

We are members of the Ocean Cruising Club (OCC), which is basically a yacht club without a club house. All the members have completed an ocean passage of at least 1,000 miles, and as club members will help and assist fellow members. We were struggling to find somewhere safe to leave Alia Vita while we visited the UK for a couple of weeks, so e-mailed a member from the north of New York. His name is Eric Freedman and within minutes we got a reply saying his yacht club, The Huntington Yacht Club, would accommodate us. So it is that we came to Huntington, and how fortunate we did. This place is lovely, the people are lovely, and the boat is safe to leave.

When we were in Bermuda (in the bar as it happens), we got chatting to a chap named Hank Schmitt, a professional sailor who we were told could advise us on a plan to cross the Gulf Stream. As it happens, he lives in Huntington as well, and this isn't a big place. On the day we arrived he was leaving town for a few days so took the trouble first to take his boat out of the bay to meet us and show us the way in, then gave us his car as he wouldn't be needing it until after we had left to fly back to the UK. The hospitality here knows no bounds, it's going to be tough to leave.

We went into what turns out to be a very historic yacht club for a drink, and met lots of very interesting people all of whom couldn't have been more welcoming.

We fly back to the UK today and back out to the states on the 22nd. 

Must fly!