by Fay Jacobs
People thought I was kidding when I vowed to recreate one of historys most famous journeysnot Amelia Earharts, but Barbra Streisands Funny Girl tugboat trip in New York Harbor.
"Im taking my boat to the Statue of Liberty, climbing out on the bow and singing Dont Rain on My Parade," I said.
Bonnie and I planned to keep a promise made a decade ago in Fire Island when we saw two women having cocktails on their boat in Cherry Grove. "Someday that will be us," we said.
So we planned the trip.
"Youre taking that little boat in the ocean? To New York?" folks said, laughing.
And when they heard that our friends Bob and Larrymen whod never spent one night on a small boat, much less tenwere joining us, they were sure we were making it up.
But we were prepared. Each couple was permitted a reasonable amount of clothing, toiletries, food, and drink. The guys did great limiting themselves on clothes and toiletries, although Id never seen that much yogurt in my life.
Roberts eager anticipation seemed based on the thrill of seeing New York harbor, as well as the challenge of keeping the boat really clean for the next ten days.
However, Larry seemed worried about being busy enough so I assigned him the task of ships accountant, calculating the amount of boat gas needed for our daily travels and the associated expenses. Then I made him swear to keep the total to himself. The golden rule of boating is NEVER under any circumstances divide the amount you spend in a season by the number of days you use the boat. Former boaters are in rubber rooms from coast to coast from doing that equation.
And we assured Larry that wed lined up devoted friends to stand by the phone day and night in case he wanted to be picked up somewhere in New Jersey.
So we packed the boat with clothes, books, booze and food and took off!
Our ships log tells the tale.
Day 1 - July 3rd: Rough start. Worst Delaware Bay crossing ever. Wind caused five foot waves, drenching us and our new red shirts, dying our white shorts pink. Robert crawled across back deck to get Larry a life jacket. I requested one too, but he didnt hear me for strains of "There Has to be a Morning After" in his ears. When the worst was over we still feared injuries from Larry and I knocking each other unconscious going for the vodka.
Made it to Cape May Lobster House for crustaceans to go, and toodled up the intercoastal waterway behind Jersey towns of Wildwood and Stone Harbor. Collected ourselves and cooked a lovely lobster dinner at a marina in Avalon. Its 70 degrees and windy. No A/C needed tonightjust open up those hatches and breathe!!!
Day 2 - Yeah. And inhale a lungful of gnats. Robert woke us up coughing and slamming the hatches.
Too rough for ocean route today so we continued on intercoastal through the great black fly fields of New Jersey. No wonder the houses have no decks. As we were swatting, shooing and snapping the flies to death with towels, it crossed my mind that the backwaters of New Jersey may have given birth to the Macarena.
Arrived at Barnegat Bay marina 5 p.m. I fired up the blender while Robert and Bonnie obsessed about hosing sea spray off the deck. By the time the margaritas were ready, the free salt supply was history. Celebrated Roberts birthday at a local seafood house, and now were exhausted and ready for sleep. In the distance we hear fireworks, but were too tired to care.
Day 3 - Gorgeous day! Cruised up the Jersey shore in the calm ocean, past long white beaches, Ferris wheels and roller coasters of Ocean City N.J. Small planes trailing ad banners buzzed overhead as we raced north. At Asbury Park, we saw something in the distance. "Is it a tanker with smokestacks?" I asked.
"I dont think so," said the captain, squinting into the haze. "It looks like buildings."
One more look and I got goose bumpsthe twin towers of Manhattans World Trade Center were rising in front of us on the horizon. But it was just a tease, as we veered west around Sandy Hook, N.J., into a marina at Sea Bright N.J.
Hearing that we hailed from Rehoboth, another boater said, "I vacationed there as a kidall I remember is that they had a gay beach, called Poodle Beach and I thought it was hilarious."
"Well, its still there," we all noted, with grins. He was cluelesseven after other boaters complimented us on our pretty rainbow flag. After a relaxing afternoon of books and naps, plus yet another fill-up on boat fuel, we capped the day watching fireworks on the beach.
Day 4 - We did it!!! At 11 a.m. with a clear sky and barely rippling water, we cruised under the Verrazano Bridge right up to the towering Statue of Liberty. As her inscription says, "Give me your tired, your poor...." Well, here we were! Awesome!
At first, feeling very insignificant amid the tour boats and tankers, I was more like Yenta arriving with the immigrant tide than Babs defiantly singing on the front of the tug boat.
"Youre not really going out front are you?" asked Robert, as the boat bounced and pitched from the wakes of passing tankers.
"I came all this way and Im gonna do it," I said, a poor, tired, huddled mass, inching my way to the nose of the boat and humming and muttering "No-body, no-body, is gon-Na rain on my..."
We all took turns hanging onto the bow pulpit for photo ops and Captain Bonnie stayed calm even when the Staten Island Ferry threatened to crawl up our butt.
Then we cruised around the tip of Manhattan, under the Brooklyn Bridge and up the East River for spectacular views of the Empire State Building, Chrysler Building, U.N., and the Feeling Groovy 50th Street Bridge.
A thousand Kodak moments later, we docked at the 23rd street marinain the shadow of the Empire State Buildingand ventured off to Times Square, Central Park and Soho for dinner at Robert Dineros trendy Tribeca Grill (no surprise: Rehoboths finest are just as good!).
Cabbing it to our boatel, the last thing we saw before falling asleep was the Empire State Building, lit up red, white and blue for the holiday weekend.
Day 5 - We wanted to wake up in the city that doesnt sleep and here we are. But we didnt know that Sinatras next lyrics about "king of the hill and top of the heap" referred to our dirty laundry threatening to sink the boat. Were debating sending it home FedEx.
It rained this morning but cleared up for us to walk around town and visit with friends. Saw four shops and restaurants sporting rainbow flags on 58th St. alone.
Yogurt is holding out. Were all still friends. And to think there were skeptics! Tomorrow, a short run to Fire Island. Hey, if we can make it there, well make it anywhere.
Day 6 - Okay, so it was a little hazy on our way down the East River, but not what Id call bad weatheruntil we rounded Coney Island and carefully ventured into the ocean. Suddenly, a thick fog completely socked us in, making it difficult to see the front of our own boat much less Coney Island. We would have stuck to our plan to hug the shore, only now we couldnt find it.
Then we heard the chilling moan of a fog horn. Omygod! The Titanic?
The guys studied the nautical charts and navigation instruments. "Were okay, I know where we are," said Larry.
We didnt have the heart to tell him that our knowing where we were wasnt the problem. Please let whoever blew that fog horn know where we were.
So we sounded our own deafening fog horn every 30 seconds, stayed as still as possible and wished we had radar instead of matching shirts.
And just when it got so creepy I thought Id scream, an enormous tug boat trailing a thick tow line hauling a barge the size of Pittsburgh materialized from the fog just a hair-raising 75 yards to our side.
My eyeballs changed sockets and I practically peed myself. Bonnie was struck dumb. "Anybody else mess their pants?" I cheerily asked. "We could have bought it back there. Just a little farther and we would have been in that tow line...."
"But we didnt!" said Bob happily. You gotta love that attitude.
As the fog lifted we saw other small boats but still no shoreline. "Were queer, were here, but where are we?" somebody muttered.
Before I could suggest phrasing for the question, Bonnie hollered to a passing fisherman "Which way to Fire Island?" I thought she should ask for directions to the Rockaway Channel and leave it at that.
The unsavory-looking boater pointed sort of East and we took off before he could see the guys pink shorts.
Still fogged in, we inched along the shore, with dozens of jetties coming into focus in the nick of time for us to avoid crashing onto the rocks.
Somehow we found the channel and puttered past the Fire Island Lighthouse toward our destination. Our three-hour hop had become a tense six-hour ordeal by the time we reached Cherry Grovebut the welcome made it all worthwhilewe pulled up at tea time with the speakers at Cherrys bar blaring "I Will Survive."
It didnt take long for us to tie up and relax on deck for happy hour to the sounds of "I Love the Night Life" and "YMCA."
If there were two women at the bar watching us have cocktails on deck and saying "someday that will be us," I had two words for them: "Get radar."
So we took a water taxi to the Pines for a luscious dinner, shopped at the local Gay Mart and headed back to the boat. The piano bar was going full blast and the Ice Palace promised dancing til 4 a.m. We were all asleep by 10:30.
Day 7 - Took a lovely walk through the Grove with its grid of boardwalks, unfurled rainbow flags and houses named Think Pink, Peckerwood, and YMCA annex. Perfect beach day and a terrific show swimwear is optional in Cherry Grove, although not for us, thank you very much.
Wed scarcely taken our first sip of our first afternoon mudslide when folks warned us that a big storm was brewing and the marina was a notoriously unprotected harbor.
We battened the hatches, put all our fenders out, tied the boat as tightly as possible and got the hell offsome of us more successfully than others.
With no finger piers alongside the boat and just a deteriorating board along the seawall as a foothold for jumping to shore, every debarking was a crapshoot. We all share the humiliation of the one of us who took a header into the water as an entire Fire Island happy hour crowd watched and hummed "Its Raining Men."
Then, from a restaurant overlooking the slip we ordered an exquisite meal, watched the boat blow back and forth, and tried to think, "What the heck, were insured."
At the next table, a woman and her husband eyed the predominantly gay crowd, including some large and lovely drag queens. The man leaned over to the four of us (seated across from, not next to, our respective partners) and said, "Pretty strange crowd, if you know what I mean...." wink, wink, wink, followed by a Beavis and Butthead laugh.
"Yeah, and we fit right in!" said Larry proudly.
The man swallowed his shrimp, tail and all.
The sky turned black, but then the wind backed off, a few raindrops fell and it seemed wed dodged the bullet.
Later, we sang show tunes at the piano bar, caught the Ice Palace drag show, and returned to the boat under clearing skies and calmer water. Now were gently rocking in the slip with hopes for good weather tomorrow.
Day 8 - The storm was not over. At 1:30 a.m. the boat started to pitch and roll, waking everybody up so we could hang onto our bunks. "My God, we had sex three times and we didnt have to move," said Larry.
At 4 a.m. most of us were up watching for flying cows or trying to hold onto the evenings expensive dinner. By dawn we couldnt wait to get the hell out of what was arguably the worst marina (albeit the best music) in the world.
"Dont you guys try to shave or it will look like M*A*S*H in here," I warned, casting off our lines.
Miraculously, as we neared the Jones Beach inlet to the ocean, sun and blue sky reappeared, turning the water absolutely flat. We set our heading for Asbury Park, N.J. and the four of us settled into doing what we did best: Bonnie cheerfully at the helm, Larry navigating, Robert obsessing over dirty footprints on the deck and me writing it all down.
A few delightful hours later, we pulled into a marina with wonderful facilities, showers and a pool. Ill take clean bathrooms over Donna Summer and the Village People any day. Tomorrow: Atlantic City!
Day 9 - The good news is that it was another perfect boating day for our cruise to Harrahs Marina. The bad news is we used all our luck on the weather. Bonnie and I escaped from the casino with just enough cash to get us home. But we did enjoy the monopoly board streets and steel pier. Atlantic City may be gaudy and ostentatious with its Trumps Taj Mahal and 100 yachts but its Jersey all the same. It does our hearts good to see folks on the half a million dollar yacht next to us beating their monogrammed towels at the black flies.
Day 10 - Another gorgeous day! This time, Delaware Bay was a lake. As our happy crew, dirty laundry and leftover yogurt returned to port, we bid a fond farewell to Fay, Bonnie, Robert & Larrys Excellent Adventure.
It was thrilling and exhausting, and if we learned anything, its this: never underestimate the ability of gay men to pack light, dont assume that a boats radar arch is merely a design feature, and invest in fly swatter futures. I think Im ready to lie on the beach at North Shores for a while and watch other lunatics cruise by in their boats. See you at the beach!
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7/25/97 Issue. Copyright 1997 by CAMP Rehoboth, Inc. All rights reserved.