Liberty Landing

Wednesday July 12

It’s my 79^th birthday today, and I am grateful.  I’ve been given the greatest imaginable gift: good health and vitality.  I am never happier than on these adventuresome boat trips.

And the last couple days have been excellent.  We ran all the way up the New Jersey coast – about 100 miles – in ideal conditions: smooth seas and sunny skies.  

We left Cape May just before 8AM on Tuesday morning.  We ran outside (in the ocean) about a mile or two off the beach, until we came to Margate, where we swooped in closer to shore for a photo op with Lucy the Elephant.

Photo op from the boat

Lucy is a 6-story-tall piece of novelty architecture, built in 1881 by a real estate developer named James Lafferty, as a gimmick to attract potential buyers to his land holdings along the coast.  When I first visited her in the 1960’s, she had fallen into disrepair and was scheduled for destruction.   Saved by a fund-raising campaign and a $500,000 grant from the National Park Service, she is now a National Historical Landmark and an AirBNB property.

Last night, we had a lovely early birthday dinner with my brother Tom and his wife Mary Jo, on the beach at their home on the Metedeconk River.  I understand that METEDECONK is an old Indian name that roughly translates as (Me) “I” (TEDE – source word for tedious) “was so bored” (CONK) “I conked out”

No reference to Tom and Mary Jo…we killed 6 bottles of wine among the four of us.  WE had a fine time!

Now – after another perfect day on the ocean – we are docked at Liberty Landing in Jersey City, with a spectacular view of the World Trade Center and the Statue of Liberty. It never gets old crossing under the Verrazano Bridge, passing the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, and approaching Manhattan.

Here’s a great shot of the Manhattan skyline with a schooner in the foreground.

We’ll dine tonight at Liberty House – perfect for my birthday dinner.