Erie Canal

6/8/11 Wednesday     7a.m. and we're ready to go. Lock 2 is just a few boat lengths in front of us. We lock through with a pontoon boat in front of us and the Grand Erie behind us. The Grand Erie is owned by the NY Canal Corp. and is getting in position to take students on rides through the lock. One group down and another back up. The crew was enjoying the break from their normal duties.

Grand Erie behind us in Lock 2.

Locks 2 through 6 are in close proximity. You exit one and the gates are open in the next. We rose a total of 172 feet in these first five locks.

Looking ahead from one lock to the next.

Locking through has been a heavily discussed topic on the "Looper" web site. Do you put boards on your fenders. What about using straw bales. Will it ruin my fenders? And on and on. We use our fenders just as we have at every other lock we've ever been through with one exception. Some of the locks fill so high that you need fenders up high to start and another set at the waterline to protect the hull when you reach the top. In total Tourist is sporting 6 fenders here on the Erie. Almost looking commercial!

Securing to the lock is in one of three ways with no warning of how each lock is rigged until you get in the chamber. 1. 5/8" ropes hanging down from the top of the lock wall. 2. Cables covered in plastic vertically secured in a recessed area in the lock wall that work much like a floating bollard. Secure a line to the boat. Put it around the cable and secure the bitter end back to the boat. 3. Vertical pipes recessed in the wall used in the same way as the cable.

In addition to the locks there are guard gates located along the canal that can be lowered to block passage.

Guard gate in up position.

Guard gate closed. Now what do we do?

Our day ended in Amsterdam, NY. The weather was HOT!

Thursday 6/9/11     One of our concerns before starting this adventure was if we could fit under the bridges. Tourist sticks up in the air 20'4" before lowering lights and antennas. We have to fit under a 19'1" bridge in Chicago. Most of the bridges on the Erie are 20' or higher.

Does that look like it's 20' above the water?

The Erie at times shares it's route with the Mohawk River. A beautiful river that winds through central New York.

Dam on the Mohawk. Notice the lock to the far left.

Several times back in my bus days I drove across the New York Thruway which runs beside the Mohawk always looking out thinking how great it would be to be out there.

View of the Thruway from the water.

When we reached Lock 17 we noticed something different. The gate lifted up over our heads to allow entrance to the chamber. One of only a few such designed locks in the world. Additionally it has the highest lift on the Erie of 40'.

Get your umbrella Pam. It's dripping water!

Lock 17 from inside after raising 40'.

Once through 17 we followed the canal walls around the corner to the city dock at Little Falls, NY. With severe storm warnings promising hail and high winds forecast we opted to stay in the boat and not explore the town. Too bad for us since the guides all say this is one of the best stops along the Erie.

Little Falls City Dock with old Canal Building as office.

Friday 6/10/11     Continuing west on the Erie our destination for today is Rome, NY. Along the way we passed the marina at Ilion, NY. Not big but built on the canal wall.

 Ilion Marina.

Another lock along the Erie.

We pulled into the free town dock at Rome in the early afternoon with time to explore Fort Stanwix. An authentic reproduction of the fort at the site where it originally stood. The fort was built by the British in 1758 and occupied by them during the French & Indian War. Following the war the British abandoned the fort until 1776 when Congress ordered Gen. Washington to rebuild and occupy the fort to protect our Northwest border.

Ditch between walls at Fort Stanwix.

Interior grounds of Fort Stanwix.

Diagram of Fort Stanwix.

A short distance back towards the boat is the Savoy Restaurant.(http://www.romesavoy.com/)  I decided to do the cooking tonight so Pam (she's not a fan of my cooking!) decided we should try the Savoy. A neat old place that has been around for years. A little early for dinner we sat down at the bar and waited for the diners to show up so we didn't look like we were there for the early bird specials. The plan worked and before long the place started to fill up. We got a table and sat down to one of the best meals I've had in a long while. Uncle Rosie's pork chops. By the time we left it was standing room only at the bar and the dining room was filling fast. Definitely worth the stop.

Saturday 6/11/11      Today is our last day on the water for a couple of weeks. We are going to leave Tourist at Brewerton, NY. and head home for a visit. But before we get there we have to negotiate 2 more locks and Oneida Lake. The lake is similar in dimension to Lake Pepin back home on the Mississippi.

The 2 locks are the first that we will be lowered in the chamber since we started our travel on the Erie and the are spaced only a mile apart so we can get them out of the way rather quickly. From there it's on to Sylvan Beach and into Oneida Lake.

Canal Corp. crew boat. Cute isn't it!

After running at trawler speed since Atlantic Highlands, NJ. the lake seemed like a good place to let Tourist stretch her legs. An hour later we were passing under the I-81 bridge at Brewerton. From there it was only a short distance to the Ess-Kay Yards (http://www.ess-kayyards.com/) where we will leave Tourist.
Filled with fuel ($4.17 per gal.) and emptied of, well you know, we put Tourist in her slip.

In the slip at Ess-Kay.

Our view of the fuel dock.
Before we head home we'll change oil and filters and do some other maintenance items so they're not staring us in the face when we get back.