Wondering where we have been? Tonawanda and Buffalo, NY, Germany and Boston, MA… But now? Happily on the way to Presque Isle, PA with 2nd Mate Cathy on board!
We arrived in Tonawanda, with all of the floating debris, on Sunday July 20th and spent a week on the wall while waiting for the mast stepping appointment.
This bascule bridge was only ever opened during its construction in 1919. The Erie Canal height restrictions were modified before it was released for use so it never needed to be opened. HATE when that happens…
A friendly fellow cheering on the runners running along the Niagara River in the morning.
On our way from Tonawanda, the last bridge which will need to be lifted for us until Chicago. Behind the Ferry Street lift bridge, is the Peace Bridge to Canada, closed to all but commercial traffic currently. Passing under these two bridges brings us to…
We shared the dock at CanalSide with the USS Little Rock. That ship is BIG!
The character of the Erie Canal changed from the tourist bustle of the tiny towns (Fairport, Newark, Medina) to the quiet solitude of New York’s upstate farms. The western section is also where canal itself changed character: the banks of the canal varied from sandstone rock to poured concrete to sections where it was evident the canal was once chiseled out of the ground. A serene off-ramp after the uncertainty of the earlier part of the journey…
We made it! The distance we covered in no way reflects the monumental advance we made; we are finally on our way to the Great Lakes!
A beautiful, benign summer morning on the Erie Canal…. in some places.
Less than 35 miles from the devastating flooding we saw between locks 24 and 26, this section of the canal is starved for water. These embankments would normally be under water. These water levels are high compared to where we are headed…
The Gates of Hell😏
This is Lock 29 being prepared for our tow boat which is on the other side of the lock gate. The lock itself was one of the cleanest, easiest we have transited.
With our fellow intrepid travelers inside the lock; we ALL had our fingers crossed…
The water level in this section of the canal is so low that only boats with up to 5′ (1.52m) draft (Tiefgang) can pass. All the other boats in the lock had a draft of 5′ or less and they were still anxious. Aurora has a draft of 5’9″ (1.75m) so we were only allowed through with the tow boat.
And this is why… These are the heat maps the Canal Authority provided to assist transiting this section of the canal. Red is bad.
The image on the left is the approach east of Lock 29. The water line photos above were taken along this stretch. The image on the right is the section west of Lock 29, the section between the two locks. At the very left edge of this image you can see the entrance to Lock 30.
Immediately after exiting Lock 29, you could see the dam construction that needs to be completed to remove this hazard. (See Stuck? No, we are on vacation …)
The others leading the way out of the lock and into the red.
Hooked up and ready to go!
I won’t bore you with pictures of us being towed but will share what we saw…
First, a snapshot of our chart plotter on a happy day on the canal… What you want to pay attention to is the 2nd number in the list on the right hand side, the depth gauge reading. We like more than 10′ (~3m). We need at least 4’2” (1.26m) of water under the depth gauge.
Yikes! Our keel was dragged through about 8″ (20 cm) of mud in the last 950′ (200m) of the passage. The tow boat had to work heavily; we would not have made it without their help.
Happily, everyone made it without issue. This is the flotilla heading into Lock 30.
Our auxiliary “engine”, Greg and his partner, in Lock 30 with us in tow.
Everyone VERY happy to be done with that passage.
Back to inviting and benign…
So, we probably lost a bit of bottom paint but nothing worse. And we only made 14 miles (22.5km), but Fairport, NY was a nice stop. Fairport also introduced us to the NEXT canal infrastructure we will need to deal with: lift bridges!
And last but certainly not least, a shout out and a HUGE thank you to the NY State Canal Authority engineers and lock masters who went above and beyond the call of duty to help us. We are forever grateful and will make sure to pass this kindness on.
We are done scribbling with an orange crayon all over the map and have made the decision to plow through the mud between Lock 29 and 30. Back, a 3rd time through the route between Phoenix and the Seneca-Cayuga canal… But, if all goes well, we will be, finally, on our way forward. Wish us luck.🤞
The near daily thunderstorms across New York have produced painfully destructive high water levels between the Hudson River and where the Seneca River leaves the Erie Canal. Ironically, there are many other Looper boats who cannot transit past Lock 8 due to HIGH water…
Not that you think all of the Thousand Islands is wilderness and boat or cabin life…
Boldt Castle, Heart Island
The Alster, modeled after a castle on the Rhine, a man cave with bowling alleys and taxidermy where guests were entertained upon arrival to the island.The main houseThe power houseThe Dove-coteThe formal gardensGeorge Boldt commissioned this castle in 1900 as a birthday present for his wife. She died in 1904, before it was completed. All work stopped when she died and the castle fell into disrepair. It was taken over by the Thousand Island Bridge Authority in 1977.When the Bridge Authority took over, this is representative of the condition in which they found the property. It had been neglected and abused for 73 years.These photos are representative of the restoration work that the TIBA has done to date. The Boldts never resided in this structure so all of the restoration has been done using plans that were left behind or from other examples of the same period.The boat house with crew quarters!The center bay has the height needed to accommodate Boldt’s sailing yacht’s mast.The boat house where the boats lived… 🙃
Singer Castle, Dark Island
Yes, that Singer.
Unlike Boldt Castle, this was the actual residence of Fredrick Bourne, the fifth President of the Singer Corporation, then his daughter Marjorie and finally a religious order. In that regard, it is more impressive for its authenticity although less opulent. Built in 1905, Bourne fulfilled himself a childhood dream, with secret passage ways and stairs running through the the castle on all five floors.
The Thousand Islands have provided ample opportunity to anchor in quiet, uncrowded bays and still have direct access to the offerings on the different islands. From the water, it is impossible, sometimes, to tell that you can reach the same site by car!
Wellesley Island State Park
Thousand Island Park, Wellesley Island
Thousand Island Park is a small summer enclave on Wellesley Island whose story is the same as Oaks Bluff on Martha’s Vineyard: a Methodist summer tent camp which has evolved into a Victorian cottage community.
A sculpture outside of TI Park’s library…
Rock Island Lighthouse
The original lighthouse is the structure above the gray “belt”. It was first located behind the keeper’s cottage 🙄. It was relocated to the edge of Rock Island (so it was actually visible) and placed on the base you see in this picture in 1903. The mystery is how… there is not even one record of this work being done.
Cedar Island
Fellow travelers making their way through the islands…
What the heck are we doing, right? We have not abandoned our plans for the Great Loop in favor of the Triangle Loop but we did need to assess our journey to date. (see Stuck? No, We Are on Vacation…) Phoenix was a way-station to Oswego where we needed to determine our best course of action: step the mast, sail to Youngstown, hire a captain and relinquish the boat for 1-3 days OR assume that our new best friend Brandon’s (Erie Canal engineer in charge of the repairs) time guesstimates are mostly accurate and head into the Thousand Islands. There was no compelling right answer… As you can see from the map, we opted for the side trip to the Thousand Islands.
We will island hop around here until July 9th or so and then make our way back to the canal and stage ourselves to be the FIRST boat through Lock 29 once the repairs are complete. In the meantime, we are on vacation… again! 🙃
Phoenix, NY
Home to irreverent bathroom humor, an early fireworks display and an “all in one” lock and bascule bridge.
Oswego, NY
The last lock on the aptly named Oswego canal and the gateway to Lake Ontario. We pondered our choices and waited for a weather window to head onto the lake.Back on open water… a nice change after a month and a half on the rivers and canals.
Clayton, NY
Clayton has a wonderful Antique Boat Museum with exhibits ranging from bark canoes to original Chris-Crafts. You can tour the Boldt house boat and take a ride on this beauty, too!Not to be out-done by Liquid State: the Channel Marker IPA is great…
The Thousand Islands
We left Clayton to explore some of the 1,864 islands that make up the Thousand Islands (to be considered an island, there must be either a tree or a house involved) and make our way to Alexandria Bay. There will be many more pictures like those that follow but here is a taste of what this area holds…
Today was moving day: 46.2nm from Seneca Falls to Phoenix, NY. We are now sitting before the first lock on the Oswego Canal. Yesterday was a short jump from Ithaca to Seneca Falls with Mark joining through the locks, then a great dinner with Peter, Cindy and Kristen (thanks for the packages!) before they headed back to Boston.
Today’s big news was the maritime rescue we participated in near Plainville. A man had fallen out of his pontoon boat and it was drifting in the canal, him clinging to the end of the right pontoon, trying to get back on board. Christian dropped the dinghy and, the boat already grounded on the south bank, towed the man and his boat back into deeper water. Sorry, no pictures as I was alone on our boat wondering how I would get the captain back on board!😬
Captain and CrewSeneca Falls in the morning lightOur wake in the morning lightFor those of you who are paying attention, you know which way we wanted to go but which way we actually went…Instead of pictures of the rescue, you get these guys.
With another week added to the estimate of when the Western Erie Canal will open for us, we will hedge our bet, re-trace our steps and head to Oswego. Depending on Canal progress reports, we will, either, head for the Thousand Islands (new scenery while we bide our time) or re-step the mast and initiate the search for a delivery captain to bring our boat through the Welland Canal (surrender). No matter which way we go from there, Ithaca was still the best decision to date… “Paradise”, as Christian refers to it daily.
You have seen the amazing geography, here are a few of the other wonderful things we enjoyed in Paradise…
So much green space! Public parks with picnic tables, swings and a carousel, multiple creeks to explore with a kayak and the best bike path of the trip so far…Karen and Mark, the kind, generous and fun locals who steered us to the “best waterfalls” and opened their beautiful home to us.Susie and Stan, equally as generous with their time and local knowledge who “broadened our reach” by taking us to Watkins Glen and Seneca Lake. Janet and Paul (back row), fellow travelers biding their time, hoping that Canada will “open” and the Down East Loop will be do-able before heading home to Seattle. They shared the anchorage and the marina with us before heading on. Ithaca = Interesting, easy and engaging new friends!Anchoring out in the end of Cayuga for a week and a half was great… until the wind changed from south to north. So we headed into Allan Treman Marina State Park and had another great berth!Lots of funky public art, in town and in the woods!A pedestrian shopping zone with not ONE SINGLE national chain store.Crazy, big skies from our vantage point on the lake…Wildlife everywhere we went…More wild life… 😜The infamous Farmer’s Market…our favorite lunch…and the beautiful, cultivated gardens.
