Au revoir, Pier 63 (plus tug challenge pix!)

And the verdict is in. No extension to the paddling season, Pier 63 will be off-limits to the public come Monday, 9/11. However, yesterday's meeting, which I did not attend, did at least have the outcome that people who aren't able to get find alternatives that fast can call the contractor to arrange to get their boats out for at least a little longer.

The end was a rotten one too, at least for me - internal politics reared their ugly head in ways I totally didn't expect, I tried to be part of it & got thoroughly squelched in various ways & finally had to take myself out of the picture. Sucks, but the guy who ended up somehow being the leader wouldn't listen to me & finally snubbed me completely when I ran into him as I was leaving on the barge on Sunday. I walked up to him & another person from the group - he saw me, and before I could say ANYTHING, he snapped "I don't want to meet right now", turned on his heel & walked away fast, leaving me feeling very, very put in my place. Now, the back story to this was that I'd been being difficult about some procedural points I really thought should be followed, when he was working his butt off to get a bunch of stuff done fast, but I was just there on Sunday to watch the tugboat races, have a nice day on the barge, and think about something other than stupid friggin' waterfront politics. I still had this cold, but right up until that moment I'd been having a really wonderful day. Anyways, that was the last straw for me, I backed out when I got home that night. Still chiming in when I have a piece of information that I think is important - I do still have hopes that something can be worked out to include human-powered boating at the barge (hence "au revoir", not "so long"), and if I think I have a piece of the puzzle that they need, I'm not gonna sit on it - I just don't think my participation is important enough to be worth the kind of fights I can see having if people are going to act like that. Anyways, Manhattan Kayak's working on it too & they are the ones who actually run the storage & who the Trust has been working with since they (we) moved to the barge in 1999.

On a happier note - Mr. SeaLevel and I went out & joined Sebago. I've been worried about that & not completely sanguine - it is a BEAUTIFUL place to paddle (remember my early full moon paddle?) but it's always a little scary trading a known situation for an unknown one.

However I'm feeling a lot better about everything now. Aside from the friendly welcome we received from the board last night, I've been absolutely overwhelmed with the generosity shown by a whole BUNCH of my new clubmates - Kayakboy (who's been working on me to join for ages - "You could teach!"), I. (who hasn't been actively working on me but has made sure I get out there - paddling there is tempting in & of itself), the commodore of Sebago, and a few others. Mr. SeaLevel and I somehow ended up making the same decisions in roughly the same time frame (I was dragging my feet so working about a week behind him) so we were trying to coordinate a boat move - well, first I. was going to get us out there, but then the communication loop expanded & suddenly Kayakboy was calling me this morning with news of Operation S.O.B. - Save Our Boats! The commodore heard of our plight & he, with the assistance of Kayakboy & Mr. Sealevel & I think maybe one other club member) is taking care of everything.

Wow. I'm so relieved. It's the most wonderful thing.

Anyways, it's 1:30, I'm finished with lunch & must get back to work now, but I'll leave you with some fun photos from the tugboat races!

Line throwing contest - here comes the Janice Ann Reinauer (one of a couple of Reinauer tugs there). The idea is to hook one horn of a cleat on the barge & flip the hawser behind it so you're secure. The guy raising his arm on the barge - that's the "GO!" signal. This is timed.


And here's the throw - D'OH!


Here comes the Growler, in for the kill - no, I mean the throw. The children in the audience LOVED the Growler, which hails from the Merchant Marine Academy in King's Point. BTW they missed too. This is not easy!



Only one tug at a time could do this - meanwhile, the other circled & occasionally indulged in bow-to-bow pushing matches.


Here's a tugboat guy getting interviewed.


Um...oooookay, you go right ahead...
(ok, in the interest of not tarring this unidentified paddler as a completely reckless maniac, actually this was right at the end, and the outrigger headed north, all the tugs were at the barge & south of it - so it wasn't as completely insane as it looks. I might have waited a little longer, but then I'm known for being boring that way.)

Here's John Doswell, the man (or at least one of the people) behind the Working Harbor Committee. Thanks for a great day, John et al!

tugboat pushing contest

tugboat pushing contest, a photo by bkfrogma on Flickr.

Looking forward to the Sunday tugboat races + evening whim to mess around with paintboxes = this thingy.

Tugboat Challenge

Oh my gosh, if I was not crewing on the schooner all day Sunday I would definitely be trotting out to Staten Island on Sunday the 4th to watch the tugboat races!!!!

Not in my kayak though, I would go on the ferry. This would be the last place I'd want to be in my kayak. It would be like being a mouse in a buffalo stampede.

(photo from the National Lighthouse Museum Tugboat Challenge site)

A Weekend At The Races - Yonkers Mayor's Cup/3rd Leg Glickman Cup Saturday 9/8/18, TUGS ON SUNDAY 9/9/18!

Miller Tugs, Great North River Tugboat Race and Skills Competition 2011

Well, I have quite the weekend coming up here! September's one of my crazy months at work, so naturally I have the first two weekends of the month booked solid and haven't left myself any unwinding time at all - it's all going to be fun, though. This weekend especially.

On Saturday, I'm looking forward to catching up with friends from the Yonkers Paddling and Rowing Club and the Inwood Canoe Club as the YPRC hosts the 3rd and final stage of this year's Joe Glickman Cup, which, in Yonkers, is run in conjunction with the Yonkers Mayor's Cup. The Glickman Cup is named in honor of much-missed Sebago clubmate, adventure sport author, husband, father, and all-around good guy Joe Glickman, who we lost to pancreatic cancer in 2015. Sebago dominated these races in 2016 and 2017 but this year the point spread is pretty close. I may end up representing Sebago in the women's races, as I did at Inwood. I did get points for Sebago that day by simply putting my butt in a boat and not wandering off the course; Yonkers does have more strong women paddlers who didn't come to Inwood, so on their home turf it might be a different story. We'll see. I had hoped to get in some practice time in the weeks since but then I invited TQ to move in with me and he took me up on it and priorities had to change.

I did just discover that there's a 200 yard swim and there's supposedly one slot left - that would be fun, I'll be DFL in that, too, but the website says "COMPLETING the swim portion of the mayors cup is WINNING", and I have been doing some swimming this year, so hey, I'm game!

So that'll be Saturday, and then on Sunday, it's the 26th Annual Great North River Tugboat Race and Skills Contest. HOORAY! Folks who've been reading this blog for a while know I love this event, so much that last year I actually started volunteering.  It's usually on Labor Day weekend, so if you're in the metropolitan area and always miss it because you do other things for Labor Day, this is your lucky year! Events will be going on at Pier 84 on the West Side from 10:30 am to 3 pm; first there's a post parade by Pier 84, then the tugs proceed to the starting line at 70th street and then come charging down the river to the finish line at Pier 84.

After the race, the tugs pair off for bow to bow pushing contests, while individual tugs vie for the fastest time in the line-throwing contest (a very tricky throw at a bollard with a fence immediately behind it - hard but can be done!). Eventually all of the tugs tie up to the pier and the crews come ashore for the Popeye spinach-eating contest (children first, then the grown-ups), a tattoo contest, and finally, the awards ceremony. You can get a ticket on a Circle Line boat for a great on-water view of the race and the pushing contests, or you can join us at the pier any time during the day, for free! Click here to buy tickets and/or download a flyer with all the details. Oh, and hey, any fans of The Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge? Check out this year's raffle! Raffle tickets can be purchased online; need not be present to win.  

Growler crew attempts the line toss, 2012

One Last Cherry Blossom Post!

Honest! Then it's back to boats! I swear! Actually I had about as boaty a weekend as I think I could imagine having without actually leaving the dock. Tons of fun, learned a few things, was entertained by a few things, repaired a few things, planted a few things, and did a teensy spot of plotting - just no actual on-water time. Super gusty, there were practically combers rolling down the Paerdegat. I coulda gotten out my surfski & actually surfed. Things had actually settled down a bit by the time the Laser regatta prep meeting was over, and I did actually reconsider my reconsideration of pulling out the ski. We'd had a lot of rain this week & when I walked down to the (fabulous new) dock to scope things out, I noticed that the water had this sort of opaque light-green tone & distinctive reek that's a pretty surefire clue that the holding station at the end of the basin got overwhelmed & stopped holding. Inauspicious circumstances for the first run of the season in a boat that soaks your okole for you. Might try to sneak in a quick spin after the Laser regatta next week.

Well, I got kinda sidetracked from the Final Cherry Blossom Post of 2009 didn't I? As long as I'm digressing -

Check Out The DOCK! Is it not fabulous and new? It's U-shaped, I'm standing at the end of one of the arms of the U. We're gonna be able to launch a 10-person tour simultaneously. The ramp is at least twice as wide as the old one, and much longer, so it won't require Sherpa genes to get your boat up the ramp on your own at low water anymore (er, um, not that you should be paddling on your own or anything like that).

OK, now back to my last Cherry Blossom post. I know I got a little obsessed on that last week - that was partly because we had a much harder work week than I'd expected last week, plus I had to go to a City of Water Day planning meeting on Tuesday, so I was partly just being lazy & slapping up videos. But I was also just really excited that I made it, I've been living in Brooklyn for a long time & although I do go see the cherry blossoms almost every Spring, I've never managed to make it to the festival. I've always either had a conflict, or forgot about it until the week after it happened, or both. I think my list of Things I've Really Wanted To Go See While I'm Living In NYC But Never Managed To is down to:

The Coney Island Mermaid Parade (June 20th this year, I'll be missing it again, although I should mention that went to something on Saturday that I think might be an acceptable substitute - less crowded, too!)
The Coney Island New Year's Day Polar Bear Swim (unlikely to happen, that's one TQ doesn't think sounds as interesting as I do & as long as our New Year's Day date is a paddle, I'll compromise on that one)
The Working Harbor Committee's Hidden Harbor Tour.

I'd like to have another go at the annual tugboat races, since stupid kayak-storage politics, run afoul of quite unexpectedly & while still in a woozy state of recovery from a bad bad flu that day (the only reason I wasn't working on the Adirondack that day - I wasn't fit to sail yet), managed to dump some serious rain on my tugboat parade the one time I did make it.

This year I FINALLY got to the Sakura Matsuri festival, though, and I was really happy about that! I promise that after today I'll resume my more typical topics, though, I think I've satisfied my yen (ha ha) to recount the fun of the day with a full Flickr gallery!

One more video too. Ever hear a koto ensemble? Pretty neat sound, although captured by a digital camera that's not designed to do justice to something like this. I hadn't actually planned to go hear this one. I was going to go see the wisteria colonnade up by the Eastern Parkway, which would be beautiful this time of year (even the wisteria spilling into the subway cut from somebody's backyard on my way to work is breathtaking this time of year), then return to the tent for the folk dancing & stay for the Samurai Sword Soul performance & the grand finale Kimono Fashion Show. Well, I headed for the the wisteria but I never made it there because there was this amazing sound pouring out of the tent & I just got drawn in. Recorded it until I literally couldn't hold up my camera any more. Maybe you had to be there - but here's what I can share.

Ernesto the Three-Dollar Umbrella* Slayer

All carnage spotted within a 3-block walk.





*For you non-New York residents - One thing that is extremely easy to purchase at a moment's notice in New York City is a cheap umbrella. Every newstand & shoeshine shop carries them. The cheapest are three dollars - when the sun is shining. These may actually have been five-dollar umbrellas, because the minute it starts to rain, the price of your standard black folding three-dollar umbrella goes up to five dollars. Econ 101, supply and demand in action. In addition, when the raindrops start to fall, the standard newstand supply is instantly augmented by hard-working immigrants pushing carts full of umbrellas and chanting "Umbrella! Umbrella! Umbrella!" (sorry if that's not PC, it's just what happens!). The umbrellas last about as long as you'd expect an umbrella that costs three dollars (or five if it's raining) to last, but if you are careful about not letting the wind get on the wrong side of 'em, they'll generally get you through a few rainy days before they give up. Ernesto was WAY more than they were ever supposed to stand, though - these poor shattered wrecks didn't have a chance.

BTW I spotted them all on the way to & from the tugboat races. Yep, I did feel well enough to go see them & it was a GLORIOUS day for a tugboat challenge. They were GREAT! Got some good pictures (plus a nifty Reinauer cap, and an MS Harborfest t-shirt, usually don't buy t-shirts but this was too cool to pass up, plus it was a fundraiser for MS)- will try to post some later this week.

Off to the Races!

(photo (c) 2004 by Bernard Ente, via Working Harbor Committee website, link below - I'm emailing Doswell at WHC to make sure this is OK...).

Wow, quite the string of races coming up here, warrants a lunchtime post!

They start weekend after next - Sunday, September 3rd - It's the Working Harbor Committee's Annual Tugboat Race & Competition. YEAH! The event starts with the Tugboat Parade at noon, then three separate events will test the mettle of these Clydsedales of the harbor and their crews - there's a race, a bow-to-bow pushing contest, and a line-throwing contest.

Of course ONCE AGAIN I have to miss this 'cause Sunday is my regular day to work on the schooner - this happens every year, I've NEVER gotten to go watch 'cause I've always got something else I have to do - but I really recommend attending if you can, it has just got to be a blast. Reservations on spectator boats and all other information is available at the Working Harbor Committee website.

The week after that, one I am far less enthusiastic about - yep, September 10th is the annual day on which they shut down the river, usually from 11 am until early to mid-afternoon, for the annual New York City Stupidboat Race. I mean Stuporboat...no, wait, the term the organizers of the stupid event use is "Superboat Race". Yeah, that was the term. Ugh. Cigarette boats... This is the one class of boat which I simply and sincerely loathe as an entire class, irrespective of how good or bad the drivers are. I'm not posting about their stupid earshattering event to tout it, I'm mentioning it to warn any local paddlers that that would be the ideal weekend to be anywhere BUT North River. Maybe you could go visit Bill and Janice at Annsville Creek, or Terri and her general manager, Ray in Cold Spring, or maybe even a nice hike somewhere...or stay home & do some laundry, doing laundry is TONS more fun than being out with those freakin' waterborne jackhammers...Ugh. Once again, gentle boaters & others who appreciate of the relative peace & quiet of a day on the water - September 10th, I recommend finding some water other than the North River (the stretch of the Hudson that goes past Manhattan). I may actually have to be there - like I said, I work on the schooner on Sundays. We may sail north instead of to the Statue - doesn't matter, though, given the 2-hour schedule of our usual trips, we can't sail far enough away to get to peace & quiet. The amount of noise these things put out, they'll need earplugs in Yonkers.

And Saturday the 16th is the Mayor's Cup Schooner Race! This was a sad day in Adirondack-land last year, this year hopefully we reclaim our honor & the cup. Or at the very least, we don't go limping home with a mangled bow. Tickets are available, check out the Special Events section on our website, sail-nyc.com, or call 646-336-5270. Sorry, no friends-of-frogma discounts available, but it should be a fabulous day out on the water. OK, if you really want to read about last year, it's here, sigh.

Mighty Cranky Power Ranger

Actually I'm not sure what that expression is - cranky, grumpy, or just determined? Click for detail - what do you think? Whatever it was, I just loved this picture - funny thing was, I was focused on the kids trying out the steel drum and I didn't see that face until I started going through my pictures! What a mug. Reminded me of that little boy who was sooo serious about the spinach-eating contest at the tugboat races earlier in the year -

and so appalled when the older kid won -- click on this one to really see that expression, the compressed view doesn't quite do it justice.

Anyways, it was a good day at the BBG the day before the day before the storm. Funny, too, I'd actually though about leaving when I'd gotten to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and discovered that they were having their annual Halloween "Ghouls and Ghosts" celebration, they were charging extra admission because of the festival and I usually go to the BBG in search of peace and quiet (I actually sometimes like to go on days when the weather's not so perfect because a lot of people won't) - but then I thought "Well, this might offer some fun picture-taking too". And it did, too - click here for a few more ! Oh, there are a few heron pictures in there, too - just the ones I liked the best, but if you already saw the full series just click through those, there's more Ghouls & Gourds after them.

Off To The Races! 20th Annual Great North River Tugboat Race Part 1: Before the Parade

9/2/2012, 9:30 AM, Pier 84, North River - the tugs are gathering for the 20th Annual Great North River Tugboat Race and Contest

Thunder III, the race committee boat

Lincoln Sea and Pegasus 

Weddell Sea and the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy's Growler

W.O. Decker, first reappearance after the re-opening of the South Street Seaport Museum

;

Growler, Maurania III, and Lincoln Sea

Meaghan Ann, Quantico Creek, Buchanan 1

Growler, Lincoln Sea, Pegasus (yay!) and Weddell Sea -- all headed south to take their places in the Post Parade! 

Sunset Sail on the Schooner America 2.0

Boy, I go from thinking maybe I should let the blog have a summer hiatus because I'm not doing anything fun, to having so many things I want to share that I hardly know where to start. So many pictures, in particular -- there was the trip to the midwest, last weekend was the tugboat race, and then this weekend is the weekend of three cups - the Yonkers Paddling and Rowing Club Mayor's Cup, the final races of the Joe Glickman Cup, and then tomorrow it's the annual Sebago Cup cruising race, which I'm in but doing something a little different from my usual Sunfish this year. Should be fun!

Tons of pix to share, if I ever finish sorting them, but I'm going to start with a Flickr album of pix from a sail I took last week after the 25th annual Great North River Tugboat Race and Skills Contest (which tons of fun, as always, and my first time volunteering, so extra neat). After enjoying a post-race drink with some of the other volunteers, I decided to run down to Classic Harbor Lines at Chelsea Piers and see if I could get on the 4:00 sail. I would've if they'd still had a sail at 4:00. but they've scooted their trip times forward a little bit as the sunset is creeping up to an earlier and earlier time.

I ended up with a choice - 4:00 architecture tour on the M.V. Manhattan, 6:00 sail on the Adirondack (the schooner I used to work on back when I was part-time crew for them), or a 6:30 sail on the America 2.0, with my old friend Capt. Kat, who was one of my skippers back then. That was a bit of a wait, but I had a book, some errands, and a bit of a yearning for a nap, so that wasn't a problem. I was glad I did, it's always wonderful to sail with Kat, I actually hadn't been on the America 2.0 before so it was about time, and then the sunset was just heavenly. A sample phot above, and here's a Flickr album - it was too beautiful a night (and too many pictures) to just do blogger uploads! Enjoy!

Project Seize the Space more or less of a success, plus Labor Day at the club

Labor Day at Sebago

Note, the following day - This was sort of a rambley post, I tried not to vent too much but was actually feeling quite frustrated at not finishing my self-imposed cleaning task within what should have been plenty of time. But I have to remind myself I did get some other stuff done - I assisted TQ with a class at Sebago, I got my annual mammogram done, took a bunch of books and clothes to Housing Works, finished the book of Margaret Atwood short stories I'd been reading and binge watched the rest of Season 2 of The Handmaid's Tale (ok I don't count watching a lot of TV as "getting something done" but I'd been wanting to watch those - I was suspicious that I wasn't going to like it once they were off the original book that I'd read and loved in the 80's, but I'm still in and ready for Season 3 now), had dinner with friends, and made it to the greenmarket for another round of peaches, tomatoes and corn (season's winding down!) on Sunday. Plus I was dealing with a tummy bug early in the week, and then the heat wave really did slow me down. Adding all that in, I guess I did manage to get a decent amount of stuff into the week. 

Well, that was one of the least relaxing staycations I've ever spent - clearing out space for TQ after 15 years having my place all to my untidy self was a massive project. I'm glad I took a week off for it, I wish I could take one more. At this point I actually have cleared out the smaller of the 2 bedroom closets (that was the easy one, that was genuinely kind of the "extra" closet in the place and I'd never put much in there), plus lots of space in the coat closet, the linen closet, various kitchen storage, and then half the medicine cabinet and some space under the sink. So I would say that that part of Project Seize the Storage is DONE. WHOOP. Cleaning bonus - I've had some recent rodent incursions in the kitchen and I found the mousehole when I pulled out the stove to do some vacuuming behind there, they'd chewed themselves a perfect little mouse-sized doorway where the gas line for the stove comes through the wall. Plugged it with steel wool, hoping that takes care of it. After that, I had to clean behind the fridge too - fortunately the only critters operating back there were dust bunnies. 

Still a bit of clutter around here and there from the point at which I basically everted the contents of every closet and bookshelf onto the floor  - that's where one more week would be faaaabulous, I could wrap this up in one more day and then I could spend the rest of the week unwinding at the beach or on the bay. That would be heavenly. Unfortunately work constraints will not allow. As it is I'll just need to squeeze the wrap-up of the last bits into the evenings after work this week - Saturday is the 3rd of the club races at Yonkers, and then on Sunday I'm signed up to help out with the spinach eating contest at the Great North River Tugboat Race and Skills Contest - that's usually on Labor Day but it's the week after this year. Always tons of fun! Will make for a busy weekend but I couldn't resist saying yes to both.

I did give myself Labor Day off. Originally TQ and I had planned an afternoon paddle, but unfortunately it got hot again and they ended up being shorthanded at the pool where he works in the summer, so he got called in. He still gave me a ride to the club, and I decided to take advantage of this surprise solo outing to get out for a spin in my surfski, which hadn't touched the water yet this year. Nice to confirm that it still floats and I can still stay on top of it. I started out with a lap in the basin, starting with going up to the top of the basin. I hadn't planned for it to be a birding paddle but there were a couple of ospreys hanging out at the north end, plus kingfishers and cormorants, and then down in Canarsie Park there was a hawk, maybe a red tailed although it was perched facing the basin, so I couldn't really see the tail. 

I'd originally planned to just do a couple of laps in the basin but I was feeling pretty solid and there was a tempting breeze coming in under the bridge from the bay, so I decided to go on out there. Went to Mill Basin and and then on the way back it hit me that I haven't practiced my surfski remounts in ages (I literally can't remember how long it's been, which isn't really good), and it was really hot, so I decided to pull over to the beach just west of the basin to work on those.  Falling in felt great but turns out I've kind of lost the knack - there was one where I was practically back on and then a big wake came in and whoops over I went again, and then the more I tried the worse they got. I joke about not paddling my ski anywhere I can't swim to shore, because it's really old (brought here for one of the Finlandia Clean Water Challenge races, Chicago to NYC, which were run in the early to mid 90's), but unless I can get the remount back to second nature I'll need to be a little more serious about that. Fortunately that's quite possible in J-bay.

After banging myself up failing remounts, I decided to head on back to the dock - surfski is a much more demanding boat than a sea kayak, I can lounge in my Romany, surfski requires constant engagement. Great to get out on that boat, I'd actually been thinking that might be fun before TQ suggested we go out together, so this was just reverting to Plan A. It was a pretty short paddle, just 4.5 miles, and I did consider going back up to the end of the basin again, but in the end I whussed out and just stopped at the club.

Busy day at the club - besides me, some of the sailors were out doing a little racing practice (the annual Sebago Cup cruising race is on the 15th - unfortunately TQ and I are teaching a class that day, so can't join in on that, and then they'll be doing some fall racing) and a pretty good group of our more experienced paddlers had launched in the morning for a paddle to the Bungalow Bar in Queens. I was also not the only random afternoon paddler, it was a good day to be a member and people were taking full advantage. Great seeing all the activity!

Looking forward to some cooler paddling weather soon.

Off To The Races!

Pier 83! 8:45 am, Monday, Sept. 5th.


Our chariot awaits! Boy, it has been a LOOOONG time since I was on a Circle Line boat.


9:00 am. All aboard!

It was fun listening to the banter among the crew - they sounded like they were almost as psyched about getting to work the tugboat race cruise as we were to be passengers on their boat. Some of the deckhands on the other boats who were just getting ready to go do their six-gazillionth trip around Manhattan sounded a little wistful when our crew told them where we were off to!


Northbound on North River. The contestants have just begun their post parade from the Intrepid in the background. The bargelike boat with a derrick on it is the Army Corp of Engineers harbor cleanup vessel Driftmaster - for a little while we were speculating on whether they'd decided to go head-to-head with the tugs in the race, but it turned out that they were there to mark the finish. A sailboat wanders onto what will, in twenty minutes or so, be the last place in the area that a small craft would want to be.


Fortunately for them, there were plenty of volunteers from the local Coast Guard Auxiliary on duty, watching to make sure no unwary passers-by got trapped in the coming stampede. Here comes one of the CGAux vessels to let the sailors know.


Circle Line Manhattan has now pulled in closer to the parade. Here are four of the nine contenders passing Riverside South (aka "Trump Place"). The starting line was just at the north end of this development, around 70th street.


Arriving at the starting line, the racers begin to turn back to the south. I think the northbound post parade took about half an hour. The southbound run back to Pier 84 (at West 44th Street) will go a LOT faster!


Lining up.


The committee boat stands by to start the race. Hooray for the committee boat!


On your mark...get set...five, four, three, two, one...


And with a great and gleeful blowing of horns (in which our Circle Line captain gleefully joins), THEY'RE OFF!


Takes these big guys a little time to get up to speed...


but gradually the white foam piles higher and higher, and the field begins to spread.


By around 60th street, the tugs have gotten up a good head of steam - look at the foam flying around those broad bows now as the three biggest tugs pull away. That's K-Sea's Ross Sea with the tall pilothouse in front, with McAllister's Maurinia III just nosing into second and Vane Brothers' Quantico Creek just behind. If I've read their specs correctly, that's a stampede of around 10,000 horses going on if you combine the three of them. MIGHTY impressive to watch them getting to cut loose and go like this!

By the way, Tugster Will explained to us later that the race is handicapped so that the Growler, the US Merchant Marine Academy's handsome vintage 65-foot ex-USCG yard tug, has got just as good a shot at winning as these big modern tugs - 1st, 2nd and 3rd on the course doesn't really mean anything, it's just all about pushing your boat as fast as it can go without going beyond that (there was at least one tug that pushed it too hard in a past race and had to be towed home themselves).


Fireboat Three Forty Three (named after the number of firefighters lost on September 11, 2001) begins a water display at the finish line.


The leaders now passing the blocks in the mid-50's - the smaller tugs charging hard past the sanitation piers at 58th and 59th street.


Leaders pass the cruise ship terminals. I wonder if the captain and crew on the tug with the fuel barge are wishing they could've joined in, or if they're just enjoying getting a show with their good day's work?


Nearing the finish line - here's a nicer shot of Three Forty Three. It was a nice morning, but a bit hazy, as I'm sure you noticed.


Frontrunners approach the finish line --


and then they disappear behind the sheets of spray.


Here comes the rest of the fleet!


And here come the big tugs working their way back north. The pier with all the garage doors that's between the northbound pair and the southbound one (Pegasus, I think - not the 1907 one I have on my sidebar and am so fond of, but another nice old tug that shares the name) is at 34th street - took the big guys somewhere close to ten blocks to stop! This is why smart recreational boaters don't mess around with crossing in front of these guys...it's not that they want to run us over, it's just that there's these laws of physics.


Hey, it's the Old Salt again!


The fleet reconvenes at Pier 84 after another great, great, Great North River Tugboat Race. I still don't know who, but I think Tugster's got it right when he says,

"my bias says everyone who participated or spectated–even before hurrying to baseball, tennis, picnicking, or what have you– won."

Oh...yeah...and that WAS a video camera the Old Salt was wielding in both of today's posts. So now that you've gone all the way through my writeup with pictures -

Yes! NOW you may go watch the video!

:D



Next Up: Pushy, Pushy! and, The Scenes of Carnage Which The Tugster Was Kind Enough To Spare You But I, Alas, Am Not! MUAHAHAHAAAAA!

Thanks again to everyone Working Harbor Committee for making this race happen. What a wonderful way to celebrate Labor Day in New York City!