GWA2: Hudson River

I took these photos over a two-day period in late July, traveling the entire 130 miles of the Hudson from the Battery to Troy while on the trip from Narragansett Bay to the “source” of the Chicago River.  RV Shearwater here surveys the river/bay;  that’s Willy Wall on the horizon left, so the Battery is behind us.

The Tappan Zee nears completion:  the gap on the left side is all that needs to be bridged.  The Left Coast Lifter will then become the “left coast lowerer,” I assume.

Infrastructure materials come out of the ground here in Haverstraw,

Viking passes below Osborn Castle,

summer play happens in the Hudson,

Buchanan 12 pushes more raw materials for infrastructure,

a tribe paddles over to Bannerman’s,

a truck lifts three vessels in imitation of Combi-Dock III,

Vane’s Delaware pushes DoubleSkin 50 upriver,

Spring Sunshine offloads aggregates at Caymans, where

a 400-ton 12-story structure awaits (then) its float down to NJ [more on that soon],

yacht named Summer heads south for Key West,

raw materials that once rolled on roads await the trip back to the blast furnace,

a horde does sun salutations on shore,

the American goddess Columbia trumpets at the top of a needing-to-be-updated soldiers/sailors monument in Troy,

 

and an oracle wearing a sea creature hat and using an old-school device taps out verbiage suggesting I’m headed for Ithaca and not Chicago, although I’m pleased with that too.

All photos and observations by Will Van Dorp, who is grateful to the oracle.

Somewhat related:  Click here for a CNN Travel clip called “Liquid City” and starts out with the sentence “most people think NYC has five boros, but there’s really a sixth one;  it’s the largest one and it connects all the others.”  I heard it while waiting at the airport in Indianapolis the other day and was stunned.  Do you suppose Justin Davidson reads tugster?

For blog posts written by folks going first northbound and then southbound on a LNV tug, click here and here.

 

Buchanan 1

She was working in the sixth boro long before I lived here, as I understand it, a former Department of Sanitation tug. 

And although my “sampling” by no stretch qualifies as scientific, it seems she’s often towing this way, on gate lines. Here and here are some previous appearances of Buchanan 1 towing on lines.

Of course, this method of towing can be seen often enough, like here, here, and here.

Here’s a close up.

And here, from almost exactly three years ago, is B1′s fleet mate Mister T doing the same westbound of the East River.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

 

Random Tugs 186

And then it was a sunny but cold day, the coldest so far in the sixth boro.  ut the light was great.

B.Franklin Reinauer headed for the fuel stop,

followed by a group that included

Zachery Reinauer,

Arabian Sea,

and Doubleskin 40 pushed by a mostly self-effacing Fort McHenry.  

 

Later Tarpon raced past, as

did Mister T and

Chesapeake moved her barge eastward.

Out in Gravesend Bay, Ruth M. Reinauer and Linda Lee Bouchard swung on the hook.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

 

East River Traffic

I’ve done other East River series, but it’s time to start a new one.  The next 12 photos were taken yesterday over a total elapsed 11 minutes!  I happened to be near South Street Seaport in hopes of catching santacon craziness there, as I did many years ago here.

Let’s start with Alice discharging aggregates, and barely recognizable, that’s Matilde the cement making vessel.

A longer shot reveals a clutch of kayakers, which I hadn’t seen while shooting.

Down by Red Hook, I see Frances approach with two barges of aggregate.

Dean Reinauer passes, pushing a deeply laden

RTC 106.

 

Those are the stacked lanes of the BQE with the Brooklyn Heights esplanade atop.

Buchanan 1 heads in the same direction as the other two units, but at a slightly greater speed than

 

Frances.

 

 

Again . . . all in 11 minutes.

 

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Go West 2 and 3

Legs 2 and 3 are West Point to Kingston, and then Kingston to Troy to lower the boat for clear passage through the Erie Canal.

Starting below, leaving West Point,

passing Buchanan 12,

HR Otter,

looking back toward Catskill,

meeting

Craig Eric Reinauer,

in awe in Coeymans seeing Eli (which I first misread as ELF) and

Ocean Tower,

 

passing port of Albany and BBC Vela,

seeing Slater in the morning light, and finally

after tying up at Troy, reconfiguring the boat for the Erie Canal.

Leg 4 starts at noon today as we head for a night in Amsterdam.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

 

Random Tugs 163

I considered calling this “random vessels,” since I haven’t used that title in a while, but here is a tighter focus for a few days:  tugboats.  Here I also randomize the backgrounds and seek out some vessels infrequently seen.  Like the rare and exotic  Shelby Rose and

Jay Michael and Vicki M and

Patricia with her racing stripes up against the gantry arms.

Wye River and James E. Brown here cross the south end of Newark Bay, where

Sandmaster has been tied up for (?) nearly a year now.

Sassafras did a circle in Erie Basin recently, and

 

Thomas, the Weeks tug, strode into town, picked up a barge and headed straight for Texas!  The first time I saw Thomas was January 2009.  Remember what memorable event splashed into the Hudson around the middle of that month?

 

Buchanan 12 here is light and seen from almost her prop wash.  I hadn’t noticed the Boston registry before.

Quantico Creek stays local a lot, but Severn I don’t see much.

Here’s Tangier Island behind . .  yes, Gerardi’s Farmers Market. 

 

OK . . . that’s it for today.  All photos by Will Van Dorp.  More random tugs tomorrow.

 

Random Tugs 155

First, my take on the identification of the tug from the film in yesterday’s post, it’s a model and filmed in New Deal Studios in LA.    That would explain the logistics.

So, for today, let’s start with Miss Katie . . . outbound last Thursday.

Miss Katie, 1998

 

Mister T, 2001

 

Ruth M. Reinauer, 2008, pushing RTC 102

 

Discovery Coast, 2012

 

Kirby Moran, 2015, assisting STI Fulham

 

JRT Moran, 2015

 

McAllister Girls, 1968, moving B. No. 231

 

Amy C McAllister, 1975, also assisting B. No. 231

 

Brian Nicholas, 1966.   Sturgeon Bay, 1987

 

Eric McAllister, 2014, passing NYK Nebula

 

Irish Sea, 1969

 

James D. Moran, 2015, assisting NYK Nebula

And finally, we return to Miss Katie because two days later, she caught some unwanted attention.  Details here.

 

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Checking Back 2015 a

Here’s what I did two years ago.  And here’s what I did last year.

This time I’ll do it differently, as post –more or less but close–the first and last photo I took each month, starting below with Buchanan I entering the Narrows on January 1 not long after sunrise.

And I won’t mention each date, but this was January 28 just before midday, Durance entering the KVK with Laura K Moran taking the stern.

Winter sees fishing boats like Eastern Welder in the Upper Bay, adding to the regulars in the anchorages like Asphalt Star and Emma Miller.

If you’ve forgotten how cold it stayed throughout the month of February, here are two photos from just off the Battery

taken on February 28.

James Turecamo ushers in March, actually that was March 6, and there’s still snow on the ground.

At the end of the month, Grey Shark was in town for repairs, an extended stay.

April 1 saw Margot continuing to extend NYS Marine Highway right through the sixth boro . . . the same day that

Kismet enters the cold waters after leaving its lair in the Caribbean.

April 29 . . . I finally caught Simone in the harbor . . . here tailed by MSC Monica.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Sixth Boro Spring Signs 2

The most unambiguous sign of spring is a recreational boat in the sixth boro.

Margot always ranges widely . . . . but when the Erie Canal is still closed for the season, she’s more frequently in the sixth boro.

Buchanan 12 is back doing stonework . . .

big scale.  In winter I’ve not seen this.  Ice preventing it maybe?

Black-hulled USCG vessels are more common in winter.  I’m not sure what Sanibel (WPB 1312) was doing in town.

Another indisputable sign of spring .  .  . is that big sliver .  . . in a vulnerable position vis-a-vis the gull.

All kidding aside, it’s an impressive boat for a guy who immigrated to the US at age 16 and got a job washing dishes . . . if that’s true.    I wonder who’s taking that selfie there?  Is that a selfie with a circle of friends, a huge boat, and a bridge in the background?

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

 

Second Lives 18

This hull was called Melvin E. Lemmerhirt for almost 40 years.  I took the photo below in 2007, as she passed in front of a then very different piece of Brooklyn land’s edge.

Here’s how the vessel looks now, known as Evelyn Cutler, maybe good for another 40 years?

Evelyn‘s fleet mate looked like this in 2007 and today Kimberly Poling

looks a lot better.

Also in 2007, I caught a Barker Boys looking like this . . .

and here’s a closer up a month later . . .

Well . . . very recently, just after northern Mardi Gras and St Patrick’s, here

is the same

vessel now known as Foxy 3.  I love the colors. I took the photo last week when it still looked like winter.

Since 2007 seems to be serving as baseline for this post . . . here was a tug known as Dory Barker then and

just plain Dory now.

All photos by Will Van Dorp . . . in the sixth boro.  Here’s an index to previous “second lives” posts.  Honestly, my favorite–for now at least–is Second Lives 10.  I’d love to find an answer to this . . . the truth is out there.