The relatively short crossing from the previously mentioned Battery Maritime Terminal to the Soissons Dock on Governors Island only takes 7 minutes, but the currents are the most treacherous in the entire harbor, due to the fact that the route crosses where the East and Hudson Rivers intersect. The boat shown, the "Samuel Courson", was built in 1953. But its days are almost numbered.After 57 years of service on the seven-mile route between Woods Hole, Mass., and Vineyard Haven on Martha’s Vineyard, the "Islander" ferry is now berthed at Governors Island, where it is to begin a second life in 2009, serving the four-tenths-of-a-mile route between the island and the Battery Maritime Building in Manhattan.
