New York

Sunday, June 10, 2018
Day 434
5,579 miles

I'll start with pictures of True North entering the New York Harbor on Friday:

Approaching the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, our entryway into the NY harbor.

The New York City Skyline

The boats of the Staten Island Ferry Line run continuously across the harbor.

We entered the Hudson River just north of the Statue of Liberty

Ellis Island

I never get tired of waving at other boats.  This one is a FDNY boat . . .

making this pretty spray!

The Empire State Building

The water around the Statue of Liberty is very busy. Traffic comes from the East River which empties into the harbor at this point along with the Hudson River heading north.  There are personal boats, barges, the Staten Island Ferry, water taxis, and numerous sight-seeing boats.  Add to that what must have been the start of a fishing tournament as we had at least 20 small to mid-sized fishing boats come screaming down the Hudson right toward us as we neared the statue.

The city stretches a long way, but once past it, the Hudson became just what we expected - banked by beautiful green hills.  The NY harbor was understandably churned up with all the traffic but the farther north we traveled the river became calm.

One thing did surprise us - the amount of debris.  Instead of crab pots, we were all on the lookout for floating wood.  Most pieces are small branches but some are large chunks of wood that could really wreck our day if we hit one.  So we traveled like on the inland rivers - slow.

We passed familiar names.  This is Younkers.

Songs popped into my head as we went by Scarborough 

("Are you going to Scarborough Fair? Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme.")

and Palisades

("When I fell in love down at Palisades Park."

At 12:30 True North crossed the imaginary line in the river where New Jersey was no longer on our left (port).  Both sides of the Hudson were now part of the state of New York.

The marina was just past the Tappan Zee Bridge, which from a distance looked like snow capped mountains.  The name of the bridge has been changed to the Governor Mario Cuomo Bridge.

We docked at Half Moon Bay Marina at Croton-on-Hudson on Friday afternoon.  Many of the Looper boats that were at Great Kills Yacht Club on Staten Island with us on Thursday night also came to HMB.  While at Great Kills, the other boats all went out for dinner.  We did not join them that night, but invited all that were going to be at HMB to have docktails on True North Friday night.

From left, the women from:

Viridian, Bob-N-Along, Crows Nest, Rascals Retreat, Band Wagon, Oar Knot, and Miss Norma

Friday night sunset over the Hudson hills

  On Saturday Mike and Jim washed the boat while I made the trip into New York City by myself to go to the 9/11 Memorial Museum.  I have been to New York City several times and have done most of the touristy stuff so this was my sole destination.  I'm amazed I got there and back ok.  I won't say I am directionally challenged, but I am the one who consistently turns the wrong way when getting off an elevator heading to my hotel room.  No matter how many days I've been there.  Or I get confused when the blue dot on my phone map is going down when I feel I am heading up.
I took the Metro North train out of Croton Harmon to Grand Central Station in Manhattan.  My plan was to walk to the nearest exit and hail a taxi to the museum, but I saw signs for the subway inside the huge station. Knowing the subway would be cheaper than a taxi,  I asked a few questions and found out I could take the number 4 or 5 subway line to the Fulton Street stop, which would put me right at the museum.  I bought my ticket and entered the subway.  There is a #4 and 5 that go "Uptown" and a #4 and 5 that go "Downtown".  I had to stop and ask another person (a police officer) which direction I needed to go.  When I got off at Fulton Street, there wasn't a mass of people doing the same, so I had no "herd" to follow on how to exit.  My third question of the day was directed to a young lady, asking how I get to the museum.  She was on her way to work and walked me right out.

Sign in Grand Central Station.  With Saturday's visit to the 9/11 Memorial, I have now been to all these locations.

I was led out of the subway through this building - the Oculus - New York's $4 billion subway station.  It also houses a high end shopping mall.

When I exited the Oculus, the museum was right in front of me.

One World Trade Center, the main building of the rebuilt World Trade Center complex.

I totally underestimated the amount of people that would be visiting the former World Trade Center site.  (As I was leaving the museum I asked an employee how many visitors a day go through the memorial.  The average is 10,000 a day!)  While standing in a long ticket line, I noticed there was no line for people who already had a ticket.  I went to the web site on my iPad, purchased a ticket, got out of the long line and after showing the e-ticket, I walked right in.  (There is also a separate line for family members of those who lost their lives in the attacks.)  I paid extra for an hour long guided tour, which was worth it.  I was an hour early for my start time, and the helpful guy at the tour desk recommended that I go to the "September 11, 2001 Historical Exhibition" and "In Memoriam" sections as they are not part of the guided tour.  Photographs are not allowed in these sections.
Here are some pictures from parts that could be photographed:

This picture hangs at the beginning of the exhibits.  It was taken at 8:30 am on the morning of September 11 - 16 seconds before American Airlines flight 11 crashed into the North Tower

These 2 steel columns were once on the east facade of the North Tower. Anticipating the possibility of a memorial or museum, workers painted "Save" on them.

"They rush in while others rush out."  The firemen of Ladder 3 were known to make it to the 35th floor of the North Tower, evacuating civilians, before it collapsed, killing all 12 that were inside.

"No Day Shall Erase You From The Memory Of Time"

A fitting sentiment for anyone who has lost a loved one.

There are 2983 pieces of blue paper on this wall - one for each victim.  The blue color represents the beautiful blue sky the morning of the attacks. The tiles are made out of paper, symbolizing the paper that was raining down from the office buildings.  

There are remains interred behind this wall, and work is still being done to identify those remains.

I walked around the entire footprint of the North tower.  These are the footings of the foundation. 

The Last Column

It was one of 47 columns that supported the inner core of the South Tower.  This remnant remained anchored in bedrock.  The different departments wrote how many of their First responders were killed on the steel support.   

Outside are two large pools, North and South, with the names of those that perished 

Just as we were all glued to our television sets on that day, I found myself watching the displays of the news footage of the planes crashing into the towers and their eventual collapse over and over.  I heard actual voicemail messages left by flight attendants and passengers to their loved ones.  I read written transcripts of other communications.  One fire chief had 59 messages from family and friends on his home phone voicemail that day, calling to make sure he was ok and that they were thinking of and praying for him.  He never got to hear the messages.  I listened to the voices of survivors recalling their actions that day.   The thousands of photographs, videos, and voices drew me back to that September day.   The tour guide did an excellent job of explaining what we were seeing and sharing information not found in the displays.


There were so many personal items on display that were found.  I'll mention one - Todd Beamer's watch.  Remarkably, it had very little cosmetic damage, but the date was on "11" and the hands were stopped at 10:03am, the time United Flight 93 crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing all 44 persons onboard.  (Mike and I have been to the Shanksville site back in 2008).

The museum encompasses all the terrorist acts carried out by airplanes on September 11 - the Twin Towers, the Pentagon and Shanksville.  It also had a section on the World Trade Center bombing that occurred in 1993, and the 6 victims of that truck bombing are included with the 2,977 from 2001.

17,400 people were working in the 7 buildings of the World Trade Center Complex that day.   All the buildings were destroyed with the collapse of the South and North Towers.

I have been to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. and the Oklahoma City National Memorial and now this National September 11 Memorial Museum.  They are all respectful in the handling of the difficult subject matter and produced the same heart wrenching emotions in me.  Horror at the depravity of fellow human beings, sadness at the tremendous loss of life, inspiration from the selfless acts of courage and heroism, and gratitude for those that survived.

I am solemn all over again just writing about my visit so there is no Unique and Random Photo of the Day.