This post was generously written by our shipmate extraordinaire, Ben Lerman

Hi Wildhorse people, Cap’n Jack has generously allowed me (Ben Lerman) to guest blog this entry. I met up with Jack and Lucie late Monday (10/30) evening, but first I got to ride three trains and two buses to get from JFK to the City Island Yacht Club in the Bronx. I love public transportation, and (not entirely coincidentally) I love New York so I enjoyed the trip. One stop before the one I was heading for on the subway a troupe of young guys started busking—rhythmically clapping and chanting while each took turns dancing. The first guy blew me away with impressive moves all executed while juggling his baseball cap on his feet and knees (with occasional long arcs up to his head). The others used the poles at the center of the car and on the ceiling to perform more aerial acrobatics that were impressive displays of strength and grace. And all this was accomplished in a car rocking side to side and packed with passengers! (Their chant periodically included the words ‘everyone is safe—no one will get kicked’!) They were a great welcome to the city.

As Jack mentioned in the last post, City Island is a world unto itself. It’s sort of surreal feeling like you’re in Smalltown, USA while looking at the Manhattan skyline… We spent the next afternoon wandering around Harlem, where the people-watching was even better than usual–lots of adorable little kids in costume going door to door to all the businesses on 125th street. Lucie felt right at home when we passed this bus-stop, and then she spotted this beautiful old Harlem subway station…

Montreal advertising in New York?

Classic!

We had a nice walk from there through Morningside Park and then over to Columbia University where we tagged onto a walking tour of the campus. The highlights for me were the beautiful old library buildings and the small chapel (though as someone who lives near the San Andreas fault I looked with suspicion at all the bricks in the dome over my head…). Afterward we tried to visit the enormous Cathedral of St. John the Divine, but he wasn’t feeling hospitable at the time, so we contented ourselves with the surreal sculpture next door, entitled “The Peace Fountain”. At first glance it looks like a whimsical piece designed to amuse children (giant crab supporting a smiling sun and moon, lots of giraffes…) but its theme is the triumph of good over evil and it includes an angel with a big sword and the recently severed head of the devil…

Yilkes! It’s also supposed to be a Chidren’s Garden!

We left the giant crab of the sculpture behind and headed across the street to a lovely French restaurant to meet Hiro, the daughter of an old friend of Lucie’s & Jack’s who is now a student at Barnard in Cognitive Science, and one of her college friends Carmen who is studying Linguistics, which we learned a lot about.

Fun selfie time!

Wednesday I got my first taste of sailing (well, motoring, since we were navigating narrow waterways crowded with big ships) as we said goodbye to City Island and headed to a marina in Jersey City. The trip took us past Riker’s Island… I had spotted “Trump Links” golf course on the bus to City Island, but we all had high hopes that this piece of real-estate would become more closely associated with that guy soon! Jack had timed our departure just right to have us passing through the channel known as Hell Gate at slack tide and we then proceeded down the East River, with spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline.

UN Building, Chrysler Builiding in backgound

We headed to the Liberty Landing marina. I took a very short ferry over to Jersey City. The ferry boat bounced off a neighboring boat as it left one shore, and then crashed pretty hard into the dock at the other shore. I asked the deck-hand if the captain was new and found out that it was his first day on the job! Luckily I felt much more confident in Jack and Lucie’s abilities! I enjoy the walk around downtown Jersey City (lots of beautiful old architecture, public art and great views of NYC) before meeting up with Jack and Lucie for dinner at a Chinese restaurant.   Our concerns when we saw how few people were dining there were unfounded (there turned out to be mobs of food-delivery guys showing up) and the food was delicious.

The view from Jersey City

Thursday was quite calm and we ended up motoring from the marina out past Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. We sadly pondered the gap between the words of a recent president about ‘sh*thole countries’ and Emma Lazarus’ ‘New Colossus’ which has Lady Liberty asking for ‘the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me’.

Goodbye to NY. Nippy with temperatures in the high 30’s that morning.

Happy to be underway, despite all the fun we had in NY

We continued from there to pass under the Verrazzano bridge and out to sea! I confess now that I was a little nervous about sailing for my first time ever through the night on a small boat in the Atlantic in November. But by late in the day we’d finally caught enough of a breeze to turn off the engine and unfurl the jib, and when night fell and I sat in the cockpit watching the water rush by glinting in the starlight, with nothing but the sound of the waves lapping against our hull, I was completely smitten. With the autopilot set, it was easy to imagine that the boat was an animate beast, a trustworthy horse carrying us along at a gallop under the stars. Hey, maybe that’s why it’s called Wildhorse?! I got the privilege of picking my own four hours for overnight watch, and was very happy to have the 4a-8a slot, which let me watch Venus rise followed a few hours later by the sun…In the evening the rise of the moon was quite spectacular, bright orange, not completely full, it looks like a big pumpkin.  Both nights the sky was clear, the stars our companions for the night watch.

Ben at the helm!

Saturday the dolphins came out to greet us as we approached the entrance to Chesapeake Bay and Norfolk, VA, so we hung out watching them for a bit before proceeding. There is a long causeway that traverses the mouth of the bay, with a narrow gap for boats to get through, but instead of bridge for vehicles to get over the gap, there is a tunnel under it, so it made for an odd sight to see a truck seeming to come up out of the water onto the causeway… We headed to our assigned slip which looked like it might be pretty tricky to back out of. So Jack executed a neat aquatic U-turn followed by his first ever attempt at backing this boat up to a dock (he did great!). Once again other boaters came over to offer their compliments on what a beauty WIldhorse is–you can see for yourself why she gets such attention.

WildHorse at rest in Virginia, looking good after passage from New York

Sunday morning was boat maintenance—Jack had noticed that the alternator belt kept getting loose despite his repeatedly tightening the bolt on the housing. So Sunday he took it apart, which was a slightly shocking experience despite his having taken the precaution of turning off the power (turns out you also need to disconnect the batteries!). It turned out that someone had used a ¼” bolt in a metric (M8) hole. I was very happy to get to help a little and to get to use Jack’s tap and die set (he’s got enough tools on the boat to repair just about anything! )

We rented a car which was electric and then used it to go to the hardware store for the proper sized bolt followed by a trip to First Landing State Park where we got the chance to stretch our sea-legs. The park is home to a tree called a Bald Cypress that puts up these bizarre looking conical structures (about the size and shape of a big traffic cone) near their trunks. There was a sign the park had posted postulating that the explanation for these was to help stabilize the tree (I thought most trees were pretty stable already!) or to help the roots get oxygen (don’t trees make oxygen??)… I think a much more plausible explanation is that God and Dr. Seuss are one and the same…

Swamp Creatures

Sunday night found us in downtown Norfolk (very pretty waterfront) in restaurant purgatory, unable to decide between lots of attractive looking options in the space of a few blocks. Fortunately Lucie was decisive and we ended up in a Japanese restaurant, the sort of place where, from the moment you walk in and are greeted by friendly staff you know you’re going to have a nice evening. Lots of yum! We only had one small bottle of sake between the three of us but we were all enjoying the buzz of good food and good friends! I was sad to have to say goodbye!! I’m just glad I can keep sailing vicariously on the blog!