Late October 2013, I bought a well kept 1989 O'day 302. This is a twenty plus year dream to own a sailboat like Bella, happening !
Literature respected Mark Twain said it out loud for me....and I took it literally.
"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

I chose to keep Bella where she had called home for the last several years at the Rondout Yacht Basin in Connelly, New York. The folks there have been so kind with advice and accomadations that it will be sad to leave next year as planned, before I can exhaust the comfort of familiarity and hospitality.

The three hour ride from my home in central New Jersey to Kingston, NY would have been pure drudgery if it hadn't been for the spectacular fall foliage that quickly greeted me and accompanied me on that ride. Kingston waterfront is quaint, full of art galleries, antique shops and restaurants. On the water it is a short motor past this waterfront, under two bridges and out the lighthouse marked mouth of the Rondout Creek to a wide open portion of the Hudson River for Sailing.

Nautical Mark - Rondout Lighthouse -
Hudson River, NY and Rondout Creek

I stayed on the water as long as I could. The sun set behind the glorious orange, red and yellow trees of the Catskills Mountains on my last sail of the 2013 season.