Up the East River thru Hell's Gate

Lynn & Mike ..around the world
Mike Drinkrow & Lynn v/d Hoven
Fri 23 Jul 2010 13:24
40:46.68N 073:56.19W   Hell's Gate on the East River
 
On Wednesday morning Tom took the train down to Manhattan to join us on our trip up the East River to the Long Island sound. We left at about 2pm, motoring down the Hudson River, around the Battery on the south end of Manhattan, and up the East River. This river is crossed by a number of bridges, but all are so high, that we had nothing to worry about.  In the picture below you see the Brooklyn Bridge and the Manhattan Bridge behind it.
 
         
 
        
Other than the incredible views the other amazing thing about this trip, was the speed of the current. Our speed over ground  through Hell's Gate, the narrowest stretch with the highest current, was 12.5 knots ...but our boat speed was only 6.7 knots!!   Have a look at our instrument reading below, and the pressure on the buoy!  Behind that buoy is the infamous Rikers Island Jail.
 
       
 
       
 
We then headed out into the sound, and saw a huge storm in front of us. Carefully we watched it on radar, slowed down and changed course slightly - nervously watching the black clouds and lightening.  Luckily we avoided most of it and put down our anchor off Sprite Island, Norwalk at about 8pm. And then the rest of the storm hit us. We had no problems but found out the next morning that many homes in this area had lost power for a few hours, due to lightening strikes.  Lucky escape!