First, after breakfast, was the Yanmar diesel. Aided by Lene and a "lifeline" call to Dean I replaced both the Racor and the Yanmar fuel filters and bled the air out of the fuel system. I used Q-tips to get the gunk out of the small places in the Racor's clean plastic bowl. That bowl which starts with all pure pink diesel fuel, filters the fuel and traps water from the fuel tank which appears as a white liquid in the bottom of the bowl and can -- and SHOULD -- be drained out, frequently. I had not done that and the bowl was mostly water with a thin layer of lighter weight fuel floating on top. The next filter is attached to and part of the engine itself. It had mostly fuel but some water too. We used the hand pump to draw clean fuel out of the aft fuel tank up into a very dry bottle, from which we poured it into the filters to fill them and then attached them. Then came bleeding the lines. We partially open a specific bolt and then I reach for a small lever that I can't see, because it is behind the engine, which hand pumps fuel. We pump and pump and pump until (A) the blister comes up on the pumping finger and (B) the bubbles of air stop coming out from around the loose bolt. We tighten the bolt and if we did it right, thanks Dean, the engine starts right up! All told it was two hours which an experienced technician could have done in a quarter of the time. We left at 12:10, an hour before the high tide, because we had a stop at West Shore Marina to fuel up. (A hundred yards south of the Marlboro YC where we had spent a night on our way north.). Fifty three gallons to top off both tanks. That is a very big purchase for a sailboat, the Marina staff noted. ILENE's tanks carry 70 plus the five in the yellow plastic Jerry can. They charged a very decent price for fuel.
Then we were off with the tide. It gradually increased our speed over the ground from 6.5, to over eight knots We passed an old warehouse, Bannerman Castle, on Popiel Island to port, and
But the most impressive views were of Storm King mountain and several "Hudson River School" painting scenes with dark stormy skies. J. M. W. Turner would have liked to paint this scene too.
The passage was dry. With the wind from the south we did not put up any sails for the first time on this Hudson cruise. But for the last hour, the "light wind" forecast proved inaccurate: 25 knots of apparent wind kicked up big waves into which ILENE plowed -- the roughest conditions so far in 2020. The crew did not like it at all and their meow's told us so. But our anchorage, even closer to the north side of Croton Point than on our first night of this cruise, proved excellent shelter from the expected southeasterlies and the wind subsided for a peaceful night's sleep on 60 feet of snubbed chain in 12 feet of water at high. ILENE was the only boat in the huge bay.
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