June 13-15

We spent 2 nights at Winter Harbour, we needed to have a gasket changed on the port engine, and it had to be flown in.  Monday evening we invited the crews from Jill Kristy, Ocean Commotion and  Stillwaters II, over and Andy talked about his favourite parts of Georgian Bay and the North Channel.

On Tuesday morning we did a little scrubbing of the deck, especially where the dirty lock ropes had made contact.  Once the repairs were done we set off at 2pm to finish the last lock on the Erie Canal.  We were through Lock 23 by 2:20, and then continued down the canal for 7 miles to the canal junction.  Here you make a choice whether you want to take the Oswego  canal to Lake Ontario or the Western Erie ending up in Buffalo.

We chose the Oswego canal, which is 24 miles long with 7 more locks to lowered us 118 feet to the level of Lake Ontario.  We passed though Lock 1 at 15:36, there was also a lift bridge at this location that worked in conjunction with the lock.

Reached  lock 2 at 15:56,  here we had a 5 foot fixed bridge to get under  

but since we were descending it was an easy feat.

Arrived at  Lock 3 at 17:03.  We then went another 6 miles to the free dock at Minetto,

just before Lock 5.  This dock has 3 spaces but they were all occupied.  We had considered just anchoring, when Loopers, Dick and Phyllis from Avocet offered to let us raft to them.  What this means is we just tie our boat to theirs as if they are a dock.

Following supper we were invited to their boat for Strawberry shortcake.  We had a tour of their Great Harbour 37- amazing kitchen with a full 36 inch side by side fridge and granite counter tops.  The engine room was also well designed and accessible. We met other loopers Janice and Dave from Willy Nilly who were also on the dock.  Andy had brought his charts and once again shared his knowledge of Georgian Bay and the North Channel.

June 15

We untied from Avocet and approached the lock before 8:00, there was a little fog on the canal.

 The lockmaster was running late, and didn’t answer our calls until about 8:10.  We were Lock 5 by 8:25, the ropes at this lock were the worst yet green and slimy!   We went another 3 miles to Lock 6, and was through it before 9:00.  Lock 7 was only another ½ mile down the canal and we were through it by 9:20.  We had opted to tie up at the free dock on the north side of the lock and were secured by 9:25.

 We went in search of lunch at the Oswego Tea company, which was just up the embankment from the canal.

We then walked to Fort Ontario which is on the waterfront, and leaned about the French, British and American’s fighting over control of this fort.

Here’s a view of Lake Ontario from the top of the Fort.

For supper tonight we will are BBQ with the other 3 boats that are tied up between the locks, Avocet, Willy Nilly and Sasha.

So now we only  have  Lock 8 and about 1 mile of canal separating us from Lake Ontario and the 55 mile crossing  to CANADA!

Well it’s been a week since we arrived in New York City & State and we’ve come along way.  We have traveled 160 miles along the Hudson, followed by 154 miles on the Eastern Erie Canal.  In the canal we  have gone through 20 locks which gradually elevated us by 420 feet.

We left the Lock 20 wall at 545, and started down the canal.  It was overcast, but there wasn’t much wind.

  Just after 7, we reached the town of Rome, which is the highest point on the Erie canal.   There was a very nice free dock located in Bellamy park.

I saw lovely yellow iris, growing along the waters edge in huge clumps- would love to take some of them home for my fish pond.

A little farther along the canal we saw portions of the original Erie canal, which is used as a dry lock

We reached Lock 21 before 8:00, but no one responded to our calls until  after 8:00.  They got the lock ready and we were through by 8:20.

We went a mile farther to Lock 22 and it was ready and waiting for us.  We got through it by 8:40.   Locks 21 & 22 brought us down a total of 48 feet- it was nice to have a descending lock- they are much easier to manipulate.    I saw a deer swim/walk across the canal just after Lock 22, but didn’t have my camera handy to get a picture.   I did have the camera to capture these little ducklings that weren’t sure what to do when 2 big boats were approaching them from different directions.

    At 9:10 we reached the banks of Lake Oneida, it is about 20 miles long and 3 miles wide.  Here’s a shot of  a portion of Sylvan Beach,

this town has 4 miles of beaches as well as an amusement park with  a roller coaster.

The first 10 miles  of our crossing wasn’t too bad, but as the wind gusts  increased to 30-40 mph, the waves also got larger.

At time the waves hitting the bow  splashed up in the flybridge causing the captain to have to dodge the splash- or get soaked.  We made it across

and were tied up at Winter Harbour Marina in Brewerton  by 11:45.

Very soon after there was a distress call from the Coast guard saying that there were people in the water near Brewerton—we suspect that it may have been the fishing boat we had seen while we were crossing the lake.  They must have been rescued, as the call only came over the radio once.

We met some more boaters and went into town to buy some provisions.

June 10

We left St Johnsville at 8:50, and  arrived at Lock 16.  We locked through alone, rose 20 feet and were out by 9:24.  We could see that there were 5 boats waiting to go through after us.    We proceeded the 7 miles to Lock 17 in Little Falls,

this was a 40 foot rise.  For this lock the gates instead of opening side ways, opens vertically so you get wet going into the lock as the water is dripping on you from the lock door.

We were out of this lock by 10:50.  Some of the houses on the banks of the river here are quite close to the water.

We went another 5 miles and came to Lock 18, which was another 20 foot lift, we were through by 11:43.

We arrived at Ilion Village Marina at 12:30 and tied up.

We had made arrangements to meet Bonnie and Terry O’Bryan, who we had met in Myrtle Beach in March at a BBQ.

They took us shopping for provisions and showed us around the town.  Remington rifles began here in 1816 and was the biggest employer in town. Guns are still made here today, there is also have a museum.

We went out to an Italian restaurant for supper-  Great  food, great evening!

June 11

Woke up this morning and it was overcast and then Surprise, Surprise it’s raining. Our plan for today is to go through lock 19 and 20, once the disturbance passes. We left the marina at 10:55, and headed down the canal, it was still raining a bit and misty.

We reached Lock 19 and were through it by 11:50.

We reached the city of Utica at about 12:30.

We were at Lock 20  in Whitesboro at 1:00, and through it by 1:20.

We then tied up to the south wall on the East side of the  lock by 1:30.

This will be our second experience at staying at a lock wall, the first one was months ago on the Mississippi.  We had arranged to meet Aaron MacLeod, a former co-worker from the CGC who had recently moved to New York state.

He drove us into Utica for supper and then took us to the Craft New York Brewers Festival, where there were beers of all kinds from at least 50 Craft Brewers.

Aaron oversees barley and malt analysis in Oneonta NY at Hartwick College, so he knew many of the participants.  Andy and I wandered around and tried many samples,

not sure where they come up with some of the names for the brew.

We were back at the boat by 8:00, after going down some interesting streets in Utica.  The river was calm and weather had greatly improved from this morning.  There is a park on both sides of the lock, and still a number of people fishing.

Another great day in New York state with friends. We have promised Aaron, Erin and Ian a ride on our boat when they come to Winnipeg in 2017.

Plan for tomorrow is to try to get to Brewerton, which entails  2 locks and then 20 miles across Lake Oneida, I’m hoping it will be calm like it is right now.

JUNE  8

The Erie Canal begins at the junction with the Champlain Canal at Waterford, near the Federal Lock at Troy and runs west some 342 miles to the Niagara River near Buffalo. The Canal varies in character. Much of the eastern canal follows wide rivers, and much of the western canal is hand dug into a hillside with small picturesque towns. There are 34 locks and 15 lift bridges.  We will be taking only the  Eastern Erie Canal up to Lock 23 and then follow the Oswego Canal to enter into Lake Ontario.

Left at 8:00 and were in the first lock of the flight with 5 other boats, 3 which were loopers and 2 other Canadian sailboats, and a 50 foot power boat.

It was tight quarters and several of the boats were using thrusters in the lock to keep them against the wall, which made it difficult for some of us.  There was a delay in this lock as several of the boats hadn’t bought their lock passes, so we didn’t get out of it until almost 9:00.    Some of the locks had both ropes and cables, where you tied off mid ship on the cable, whereas others only had ropes.  The ones with ropes were a little more difficult to hold tight to the wall as the wind was gusting at 20-30 knots.    We were though Lock 6 at 10:40, we had only gone 2.2 miles in the 5 locks but had risen 169 feet in elevation.   And made it through Lock 7 by 12:20.

Lock 8 at 2:10, Lock 9 at 3:10 and Lock 10 at 4:10.  At this point we were exhausted from holding ropes – so called it quits and tied up at the Amsterdam River  link Park at 4:30.

We met loopers, David and Claudia on Stillwater II, who had arrived earlier in the day.

Andy and I  went to the restaurant at the marina for supper and met some of the Amsterdam Power Squadron members who were having a meeting.  Should sleep well tonight, although there is a rail line very close to us- not sure how often the trains run.  The wind is still gusting- so glad we are tied up securely.

June 9

Well I found out that through the night, trains come by about every hour and a half, and after   6 a.m. they come about every 20 minutes.  We left the marina  in Amsterdam at 7:40 and were through Lock 11 by 8:05.

This was a rope only lock and because we were by ourselves we  went 2/3 of the way in and selected 2 ropes.  We told the lock master about how difficult we had found it yesterday and he told us that with high winds he would never have allowed 6 boats in together.

We were through Tribes Hill lock 12 at 8:55, which was a rope and pipe lock.  At about 9:20 a storm was blowing through with rain, so we tied up to a wall in the town of Fonda for about 40 minutes to let the storm pass, this is where the Henry Fonda clan is from.  We made it through the Randal Lock 13 at 10:58.  We continued down the Mohawk River and went through Canajoharie Lock 14 at 12:14.  We were still locking alone, however the wind was gusting quite strongly and holding the ropes was becoming a chore.  We decided to only do one more.  On the approach to Lock 15, we saw this  bridge was all cocooned up maybe it didn’t like the wind either!

We made it through Fort Plain Lock 15 by 12:50 and had contemplated tying up to the East side of the lock but the wind was brutal, so we continued on.

There was supposed to be a dock at mile 69.7, but it wasn’t there, so Andy called the St. Johnsville municipal marina.

We tied up there at 1:30.  In 6 hours today we went a total of 31 miles it’s slow going in the Erie Canal!

An hour or two later, David and Claudia from Stillwater II joined us.  We had docktails  together  after 5.

In the evening, a couple came and turned on the lighthouse which is nearby, which is dedicated to Bernie who was the harbour master here for many years.

I saw these wild flower and included them as they were purple.

View of the river at 5:45– calm with some fog, as it is only 42F here.

We are about a mile and ½ from the next lock, which we will tackle this  morning, and  then only 2 more  ( one is a 40 foot lift and the other 20 ) today as our destination is Ilion.

June 7

We slept fairly well in Duck Cove although a power boat went by at 12:30, and then we had rain and lightning at 3:30, followed by the trains starting up around 5:00.  The boat near us was still being loaded.

It seems that on both sides of the Hudson along the shore there are train tracks, and we’ve seen lots of commuter/Amtrak trains.

We left our anchorage at 6:15 and continued up the Hudson.  We crossed the Hwy 23 bridge just after 7:00,  on our approach to Athens at 7:30  — not Greece, I noticed something strange on the  train siding.  It looked like grain hoppers.

Getting closer I took these pictures—grain cars belonging to the Government of Canada and Alberta.  Wouldn’t have expected to see them here– maybe if I reported this I would get a finders fee– LOL

Athens had a lighthouse as well.

About an hour later I saw what may be a NY farm yard up on a hill.

We passed by several marinas and boat clubs.

There was a fair bit of debris in the water, some of it was very large logs.

By 11:00 we were approaching Albany, the state capital.

We continued on by 12:20, we were in the Troy Lock, which  brought us up 14 feet.

A few miles farther and we came to this sign  where people have  to make the decision if they are going to  continue on the Hudson to  the Champlain Canal  or take the Mohawk/ Erie Canal.  We chose the Erie,

and tied up at the  floating docks in Waterford.    We reconnected with Darcy and Wally from Summertime, who we had fist met in Myrtle Beach.  We also met Duane and Diane from Diva Di, who had passed us several times in the last few days.

We went for a walk to check out our first lock, and paid the NY Canal system fees.   We watched a large boat come into the lock.   

We then walked around town and did some shopping.  In the evening we went to an Irish restaurant for supper.  Andy visited with some of the other boaters.  We plan to lock through at 8:00.  The Waterford flight which  is a series of 5 locks, that takes about 2 hours, not sure how far we will get today as there are many locks to go through.

Here’s the information on our first lock  June 8th,

Saw this cruise liner come into the harbor, late yesterday afternoon.

  We had a storm blow through last night about 5:30, with high winds and rain of course, but it had started to clear off by 9:30.

Here’s the statue of Liberty  at night.

We got up shortly after 5, and weighed anchor by 6.  It was just as well as Andy had to maneuver around a lot of traffic, and it likely would have been worse if we had waited longer. There were all kinds of water taxis and ferries crossing the Hudson as well a tugs, barges and other pleasure craft.

It was still kind of foggy or smoggy in the big apple, but here’s some of my early morning pictures.

We reached the Highway 95 George Washington Bridge) at 7:40,

  and were in Yonkers  by 8:30,

and were in Tarry Town by 9:20, where they seem to be constructing a new bridge.

We moved into the Catskills,  amazing scenery, so close to NYC.

You know I like lighthouses…here’s  some  that I found along or in the Hudson today all very different.

Our original destination was Kingston, which we reached at 3:20, we decided to go another 17 miles to an anchorage in Duck Cove, which we reached at 5:05. We are anchored about 1 mile away from where this  boat is being unloaded.

Saw this tug go by about an hour ago– must be a span for a bridge.

 Our distance for the day was about  110 miles,  once we were out of NYC we rode the tide, at times going over 11.5 mph, which really helped.  The temperature was in the mid to high 80’s   Great Day for Cruising.  Hope to get to Troy and  the start of the New York Canal System tomorrow.