August 21-29
New York City to Greenwich, CT
Nora, MacDonalds and Selenskis

Ports:  New York, Huntington, Old Saybrooke, Block Island, Martha's Vineyard, Newport, Greenwich

We began the next leg of the summer cruise with arrival at Newark airport on August  21.  Another excellent meal at the Liberty House Restaurant http://libertyhouserestaurant.com/ with great views of Manhattan.  We did not get to the Lightship bar for a drink which was on the plans but time did not permit.  The matre'd at the restaurant is Carlo, who was quite accommodating and made sure that we got the best table in the house.

Prior to leaving we took a tour of Ellis Island on one of the harbor tour boats.  While I have been to New York several times, I had never done this and it was worth the visit.

We departed the Marina at noon and proceeded up the East River past the Brooklyn Bridge,  UN Building, LaGuardia and Rikers Island thru Hell Gate (at near slack) and on into Long Island Sound.  

Our first port of call was Huntington Bay where we berthed at the Huntington Yacht Club.  Huntington, like most of the harbors in Long Island is stuffed with boats.  The YC is a taxi ride to town, where we dined at ?

The next day was one of the longer days on the sound as we sailed to Old Saybrook http://oldsaybrook.com/ on the Connecticut coast.  We stayed at the ? Marina which was actually about 2 miles to town and given the hour of our arrival and the need for a nap we never ventured into town, but had a good meal at the resort.  

Block Island http://www.blockisland.com/ was our next port, a relatively short trip.  We planned on anchoring in Great Salt Pond, but were unable to find a hole large enough so wound up going dockside at the fuel dock at Champlin's Marina.  The marina here is not my favorite, large and filled with noisy weekend boaters.  An eminently miss-able experience.

Martha's Vinyard was our next stop.  We took the town mooring ball in the outer harbor ($35/night).  A bit choppy in the afternoon due to the NE wind, but a great anchorage after the wind died that night.  Took the water taxi to town for a few hours, the girls shopped and the guys went to a bar after a brief walk around Edgartown.  We did visit the Inn where Nora and I had stayed about 8 years ago. On return to the boat the water taxi driver managed to bang into the swim platform scraping off a section of gel coat.  

Newport was our last major visit.  We berthed at West Wind Marina on the south edge of downtown.  As it happened we were just in front of BIg Zip the boat whose captain Ken Gibson we had met in Annapolis and who had helped me with the air conditioning problem.  We hiked the southern portion of the cliff walk, which provided excellent views of some of the mansions, but which was difficult walking over rocks.  A couple of excellent dinners at Bouchard and Pronto and lunch at the Black Pearl, but a few of the many fine restaurants in Newport.

For the last night we made the short journey to Greenwich Bay near the historic town of East Greenwich and Warwick.  This was to be our departure and layover port.  It only 15 minutes from the Providence airport and there is a decent casual restaurant, Chelo's, on premise.  The dock however is unprotected from easterly winds.  In addition there is a lot of wake from boat traffic to and from this and another nearby marina. They had no room on any of the inner docks and very few that would have accommodated us had they been available, so this would not be my choice for a future stay.  Most of the marina's in the area had few berths for a boat our size and I was unable to find a place to move the boat.  We had a 15-18 knot wind out of the east for several days, so it was rocky and created some consternation on the potential for damage should  a fender pop out.  That did not happen however.  On the same dock was the 155 foot Imagine owned by Ron Howard.