The Erie Canal - Part 2

♫ “I’ve got a mule her name is Sal, 15 miles on the Erie Canal” ♫ I’ve had that song in my head ever since we started on the Canal; I wish I could remember more of the words. Paul said he has no recollection of singing it in grade school but it definitely stuck in my mind!

We left Canajoharie Thursday, the 21st and saw some beautiful bucolic scenery along the way. As you can see the wind wasn’t a factor today. Now that we’re strictly a power boat, no wind is just fine with us.

We went through 5 locks, #13 through #17. Lock 17 is just before Little Falls and raised us up 40 ft. It’s the largest single step lock on the Erie Canal. This is the view off our stern after the lock doors closed.

All except for our first day we've usually been the only boat in a lock. We're way behind most of the Loopers traveling this way but the consensus is that the high cost of fuel is keeping a lot of boaters off the canal this year. We’d never shared a lock with kayakers before but there were 6 of them in Lock 17 with us.

Little Falls is nestled in a deep gorge at the heart of the Mohawk Valley and is a great stop along the Canal. There’s a new facility for boaters with a lounge area and showers. Dockage is $1/ft. with electricity and water. The library in town is in a restored old home; we had the old dining room all to ourselves to use their wifi – very cool. We were in Little Falls two nights and got to use our bicycles quite a bit.

The m/v Knot Home was there also so we had another visit with Larry and Dorothy on our boat this time. On Sat. morning we went together to a great little Farmer’s Market. The prices were great and we got the sweetest corn and tastiest tomatoes I think I’ve ever had. We all had breakfast at a café near the canal and we were off. Safe travels Knot Home!

Another neat thing we did in Little Falls was visit the 1764 Herkimer Home. It was about a 3-mile bicycle ride on this trail that was a former railroad track. There’s also a multi-use Canalway Trail between Albany and Buffalo that closely parallels the Canal. Nearly ¾ of the 350-mile trail has been completed; we often see bikers on it along the way.

This is the rear of the Georgian style home of Brigadier General Nicholas Herkimer.

Herkimer was a Palatine German farmer, Indian trader, and prominent Mohawk Valley businessman who became commander of the Tryon County local militia. He became a hero during the Battle of Oriskany in 1777. Despite a bullet wound to his leg, and although greatly outnumbered by the British and Mohawk, he and his command held the field. Following the battle, Herkimer was carried home, where he died 10 days later. His actual cause of death was attributed to inept medical care as he bled to death.

A costumed interpreter gave a very informative tour of the home and grounds. We learned she is a native to the area and is actually distantly related to the former master of the house.

Here’s the beautiful view overlooking the present day Erie Canal/Mohawk River from the front yard. I wondered the age of this huge maple tree.

A happy and safe Labor Day weekend to everyone from the beautiful new library in Seneca Falls, NY (we're on another sidetrip from the Loop route).

The Erie Canal - Part 1

The Erie Canal, built between 1817 and 1825, is 363 miles long and was the first all-water link between the Atlantic Seaboard and the Great Lakes. It opened vast areas of the upper Midwest to settlement and commercial agriculture and made New York City the nation’s prime seaport and seat of world trade. The current canal has 35 locks which will raise us approximately 565 feet to the level of Lake Erie. After hearing so much about it, we were anxious to get started.

We bought a season pass for $75 so we could take our time; the other options are 2-day and 10-day passes. We left Waterford on Tuesday August 19th in a light drizzle so on went the foul weather gear. Locks 2 thru 6 (remember there is no Lock #1) are called “the Flight of Five” and raise you 169 feet in just 1.5 miles. This is Paul keeping our mast off the lock wall at Lock 4.

These locks all had ropes for your bow and stern and some also have a cable or pipe to tie at midships. We found having the line at amidships and using a boat hook at the bow and stern was just as effective as holding onto the slimy lock ropes.

Here’s an eastbound boat exiting the lock we’re heading for next. It was one lock right after another and kept us very busy for a couple of hours.

This first part of the Erie actually follows the Mohawk River. This is one of the reasons we had to have the mast lowered – lots of low bridges.

This dam at Lock 8 is quite wide, some are much smaller.

We went through a total of TEN locks on Tuesday – definitely a record for us. The highest lift was 35 feet and the lowest was 12 feet. We tied up for the night just past Lock #11 at Amsterdam, NY. This was a free dock with electricity provided by the town but not a lot happening. We walked to find a store in the morning but weren’t successful so on we went. It’s getting quite cool at night and the feeling of fall is definitely in the air.

There were only two locks to negotiate the next day but the wind was brisk so we had to be vigilant about not letting the mast hit the lock walls. Luckily they were only a 12ft. and 8ft. rise so no real problem. The locktender was wearing a NY Jets shirt so we had the Brett Farve discussion. The Jets fans don’t seem that thrilled to have him.

It felt rather odd to be cruising down the Mohawk at 7mph with the traffic of I-90 (NY Thruway) on our left and freight trains speeding by on our right!

We stopped for the night at Canajoharie and tied behind m/v Knot Home. We’d first met these Loopers from FL, Larry and Dorothy, in Charleston, SC so it was fun to share Loop adventure stories with them at happy hour on their boat. (The wooden cut-out dog is one of three there to scare away the geese. It's not working so well; the lawn you see is full of goose doo doo!)

Canajoharie means “the pot that washes itself” in a native language. So we took a walk to see this natural wonder scoured into the creek’s dolostone bedrock. Paul is standing in front of one of the boiling pots but the water was rather low so it wasn’t as dramatic as it could have been but still neat to see.

Another item of interest was this traffic light they call a “dummy light”. It’s supposedly one of the earliest traffic lights and the oldest in the country still in use today – wow!

Enough excitement for one blog posting!

No More Sailing

Last Wednesday the 13th we left Hyde Park Marina on a beautiful sunny day with more gorgeous scenery to see along the Hudson River. We arrived at our destination on Catskill Creek around 2pm.


This “unique” place was recommended as a good facility to have your mast taken down. The low bridges on the next part of the route and the locks on the Eric Canal require us to be a power boat again. The Creekside Restaurant is on site and is much nicer inside than their restrooms/showers building – see picture. Most boaters decide to shower on their boats.

We had a big problem getting the roller furling disconnected as the drum mechanism is buried in the anchor locker. By the way, Beneteau no longer puts this system on their newer models and we know why! Paul and Shawn of Hop-O-Nose alternated having their heads in the anchor locker working on it until Paul finally got it to let loose and their crane lowered our mast onto the supports around 9pm! By this time we had been through intermittent thundershowers and made a run to the local Price Chopper for groceries in a borrowed car. They said we won the prize for being the “biggest pain in the ___”. Just our roller furling that is!

We ended up being there three nights. This is our new "look" as we left on Saturday the 15th. We did a simpler job this time and didn't detach all the rigging. We just laid everything along the mast and wrapped it with a large roll of clear plastic. Also we'll be on calmer waters, not like the waves on Lake Michigan last Fall.

Back on the Hudson we motored under the Rip Van Winkle Bridge.

This was our view aft (behind us) of the lovely Catskill Mountains.

This was our obstructed view forward going under another set of bridges.


It’s a little challenging to see through the supports , shrouds, etc.

We spent a peaceful night anchored in Schodack Creek off the river. There were quite a few boats rafted together that were there for the night also.



On Sunday we went past Albany, the capitol of New York. The most exciting thing about Albany was seeing five or so homemade boats in some sort of a parade. We weren’t sure what it was all about but they looked like they were having a good time!

Later on we encountered our 29th lock of the trip but our first since June 5th leaving the Dismal Canal in Virginia. The lock at Troy, NY is a federal lock operated by the U.S. Corps of Engineers, unlike those on the Erie Canal which are operated by the State of New York.

This lock was a bit different as you put your line around a pipe going down the side of the lock wall. We had that line midships, Paul was at the bow keeping the mast off the wall (very important!) and I was at the stern fending off as needed. It was a little tense at the start but all went well. ONE down and thirty-four to go!

This was the sign as we turned west and tied up at the Waterford, NY Visitors’ Center.


We think we’re going to like this part of the trip. There’s no charge for your first two nights at the dock, after that it’s $10! The town provides free water, electricity and a shower (of sorts) in the visitors’ center but what do you want for nothing? We ate at an Irish Pub in town and walked a few blocks to a very new and clean laundromat (something else we’ve come to appreciate on this trip). We also checked out Don and Paul's coffee shop. We were told they have depression era prices. I (Em) had the special of two eggs, toast and coffee for $1.75 - such a deal!

Tomorrow morning we’re off to the first lock of the Erie Canal which is about 100 yards in front of us. Paul says to say that it’s officially Lock #2 (there is no Lock #1).

Note to those who love Ginger: more evidence of fleas - boo! The Frontline Plus AND Hartz flea powder AND flea collar don’t seem to be working. Luckily we’ve never seen any of the critters in the boat and only a very few on her, just their “leavings” – so icky!

Back to NYC and up the Hudson River

August 8 was the opening ceremony for the Beijing Olympics and we were able to watch some of it while on the mooring ball back in Port Washington. We were there again to reconnect with Kyle. He came in on the train to begin Part II of his Loop experience. The next day we did the reverse trip from Long Island Sound to NYC via the East River. It was fun having Kyle along on this portion. He enjoyed sailing under the bridges he’s driven over so often and getting a different perspective of other familiar places in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Hell Gate wasn’t “hellish” this time either; the trick is leaving at the right time to have the tide in your favor.


We turned into the Hudson River at the tip of Lower Manhattan with another view of Lady Liberty. This was new territory for us seeing Manhattan from the west side of the island. We got a mooring ball at the West 79th Street Boat Basin for $30. It was a great location right at Riverside Park where there were lots of bikers, joggers and families out for a stroll – great for people watching. This was the first mooring ball in a long time that had a dinghy dock instead of a water taxi so that’s how we got to shore to see some of the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

This is the view looking north toward the George Washington Bridge from our mooring ball. Believe me it wasn’t always this peaceful! The basin is well known for rough water and we did our share of rocking and rolling from the passing tows and other boat traffic. We knew it was only for a night so we weren’t too bothered by it.

We had a great lunch at a place Kyle knew, Niko’s on Broadway at W. 77th Street. Then we walked to a little bakery and had what we thought to be the best cookies in the world! We walked some more and saw part of the west side of Central Park. I’d seen this balloon on TV a few times on the Today Show so I got a kick out of seeing it “in person”. People were out in rowboats on this little lake in the park - one of several. Building such a large park right in the center of Manhattan Island seems like a brilliant idea to me.


Kyle showed us the Dakota Building where John Lennon was killed and where Yoko Ono still lives. It was also the film location for "Rosemary's Baby". We picked up a few groceries at a packed little market and visited a wine store. No celebrities were sighted.

Monday it was time to head north up the Hudson. This is a view of the famed George Washington Bridge between Manhattan and New Jersey.

This was momentous for us as our boat insurance rates drop considerably once we’re under this bridge! We went past Yonkers, another place where Kyle lived during grad school. Just north of there is the northern border of New Jersey. New York is on both sides of the Hudson from here on. The next famous bridge was the Tappan Zee, another name of Dutch heritage. This area is the setting for Washington Irving's "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow". In fact, in 1996, North Tarrytown, NY changed its' name to Sleepy Hollow and the author is buried in the cemetery there. We were able to sail a lot of the way as the river is quite wide – 3 miles at the widest point with high bluffs on either side - beautiful scenery. Water depths reach over 100 feet here.

This is an area familiar to Kyle; he and Lizzie enjoy hiking near here. This is Bear Mountain Bridge where the Appalachian Trail crosses the Hudson River.

We anchored off a county park in Haverstraw Bay near Croton and had a much more peaceful night. Kyle really enjoys the peace and quiet and wide-open spaces. It’s therapeutic for the city dweller who grew up in rural Wisconsin.

It was mainly a motor trip on Tuesday; part of it in some heavy rain. The West Point Military Academy is very impressive from the water. Paul had visited there in the sixties for his Brother Jim’s graduation. It’s no longer possible to dock your boat and tour the academy but we would have loved to do that. Kyle voiced his opinion by yelling "War is not the answer!" while we passed by, but I don't think anyone heard him!

Here are some of the helicopters we saw airlifting cadets in training.

We went about 42 miles to the Hyde Park Marina just past Poughkeepsie. We passed Vasser College on the east bank of the river and saw two of their sculling boats gliding down the river. Capt. Joe was there to greet us. We felt a bit dwarfed docked behind “Blue Sky” at 103 feet!

On Wednesday Capt. Joe (what a character) gave us a ride and we toured FDR’s boyhood home and museum and library just a few miles away. It was all very interesting and informative learning more about his presidency from 1933 to 1945. Here’s part of the front of the home.

We learned that the Dutch pronunciation of Roosevelt would be Roosenvelde which means garden of roses. It's appropriate then that the gravesite of FDR, his wife Eleanor, and favorite dog Fala, contains many varieties of roses, all of them beautiful.

Then it was a last farewell to Kyle. It was fun having him share a few more days of the trip with us. Capt. Joe gave us a lift to the train station in Poughkeepsie and Kyle was off to Grand Central Station in NY, then the subway to Brooklyn.


Here’s the view north from the marina where we stayed two nights. The scenery is gorgeous here.
It was just a half day trip for us to the Hop-O-Nose Marina on Catskill Creek where we’re having the mast taken down for the Erie Canal. The sails are off and bagged and Paul will work on re-building the supports this afternoon. This is where he really envies the Loopers in their trawlers who don’t have all this work taking down their masts; however, we wouldn’t trade them their bills at the fuel dock!

Misc:
It was interesting to be in the NY area when all the Brett Farve hubub was going on. We bought a "Newsday" in Long Island with a full page picture of Brett with “JET FARVE” in huge green letters. TV covered his meeting with Mayor Bloomberg but he wasn’t presented the key to the city – yet! What a strange turn of events.

All for now from Catskill, NY.

Adventures on Long Island

On Tuesday we crossed to the northern side of the Sound. We came up the Norwalk River and tied up at the Visitors Dock in Norwalk, Connecticut. We mainly explored the So No (South Norwalk) part of town and ate at the Brewhouse. When Paul ordered their own microbrewery specialty, we found out they haven’t brewed their own beer in six years – go figure!

The next night we anchored off tiny Charles Island near Milford, CT and the night after we were on a mooring ball in the Thimble Islands near Stony Creek, CT. They’re said to resemble islands off the coast of Maine but they reminded us of the North Channel.


We thought about continuing east and exploring Rhode Island a bit but decided against it. It’s been quite foggy in the mornings and since our radar decided to stop working awhile ago, we didn’t want to chance being out in fog. We headed south back to the New York side of the Sound and got a mooring ball with the Setauket Yacht Club at Port Jefferson. The deal here is the mooring ball is $45 per night and the launch to go to shore is included. Port Jefferson is another town that reminded us of Fish Creek in Door County. It’s a picturesque waterside village with lots of gift shops, art galleries and the best ice cream we’ve had on the whole trip!

Here’s part of the mooring field and one of the three ferries that cross from Bridgeport, CT to Port Jefferson, NY - about a 75-minute trip. We definitely noticed when they were coming and going with the warning horns and wake they created. Thankfully the last run was at 9:30 pm.

Here’s a sculpture on the waterfront designed to honor the shipbuilding past of the area:
The best option for a grocery store here was 2+ miles out of town so we treated ourselves to a taxi ride for that. It was actually kind of fun shopping at Giunta’s Meat Farm. Their produce was mostly local and priced quite low. Also ordering from the deli was a little different from my Festival Foods in Green Bay, WI! It’s times like this that I long for a larger refrigerator. If I buy corn on the cob and too many bulky items it’s quite a challenge to fit everything in. I love melons but I guess they're out for this summer.

We headed back to Oyster Bay again. There was plenty of wind but of course it was coming from the northwest where we were headed so lots of tacking involved. At one point I counted 100 sailboats within view! Here’s a scene from along the shoreline - it’s really a beautiful area.

Here’s where the big adventure begins. As we were motoring in to Oyster Bay to anchor, our alternator light came on (not a good thing). Paul was afraid once we shut the engine down it wouldn’t start again and he was right. We thought it was a similar problem to what happened back in Cambridge, MD but we weren’t able to get it started this time. Long story short: we were anchored here FOUR nights instead of the one we’d planned! Paul called four different marinas/boatyards and they all seemed to be backed up with work. One place sounded promising, lots of calls back and forth, but we finally gave up and called a place nearby in Huntington and they had a mechanic available – yay! We thought we’d get a chance sometime on this trip to take advantage of having Boat U.S. towing insurance and this was it. The tow driver showed up Thursday morning and off we went for the 10-mile ride back to Huntington. The funny thing was he called at midnight the night before (we were asleep) to say he was in the area and did we want to go in 30 min? We declined. It would have been a circus leaving in the dark trying to unwind two anchor lines that had gotten entangled. The tow ride was kind of relaxing; just sit back, steer a little and enjoy being pulled along at 7.4 knots.

This is approaching Huntington Harbor; hundreds and hundreds of boats on moorings. There isn’t dock space available besides the cost is quite high to keep a boat at a slip in this area.

As we came into the harbor, the tow boat came alongside, tied his lines to us and steered us up to the gas dock – pretty slick.

Here’s Mitch and his co-pilot, Jessie. It was funny how Ginger and Jessie barked back and forth to each other. I think Ginger wondered how this other dog just showed up out in the middle of the water!

I don’t want to make this too long but we actually had two problems: a loose wire and a bad alternator. This is the one we had rebuilt back in Savannah, GA in May. It only had about 200 hours on it since the rebuild so this shouldn’t have happened. Now we have a brand new one and the mechanic, Bruce, was fast and very competent. We had the work done at Willis Marine Center, very good work and a fair price. They let us borrow their truck for a West Marine and grocery store run too. We used one of their mooring balls that night and we’ve never seen rain like that. It’s a good thing Ginger is going deaf – the thunder claps were unbelievable. It would let up a little then start pouring again, probably more than an hour total. It hailed for about a minute then sirens started going off. We didn’t see any funnel clouds, not like we could head for the basement, so we stayed put.

So we’re heading out today, back to Port Washington on Manhasset Bay where Kyle plans to come by train and ride back with us on the East River and through Hell Gate again. This has been quite a side trip – more memories for a lifetime and thank you Lord for keeping us safe!

On to Long Island

On Saturday, July 26th we began our first side trip off the official Loop trip. We were told Long Island Sound was a neat place to explore and do some sailing and when I (Em) heard it would be cooler and less humid than the Chesapeake Bay area, I was all for it.

We headed north up the East River and made our way through the commercial and Saturday boat traffic. Here’s one of the four waterfalls that are on display in NY until mid-October.

It was very cool to see the famed Brooklyn Bridge from the water.


In this picture you can see the Brooklyn Bridge, the Manhattan Bridge, the Williamsburg Bridge and another one of the waterfalls.



We went past the Empire State Building, the United Nations, near La Guardia Airport and under the Queensborough and Triborough Bridges. Next was the notorious Hell Gate. It can be quite treacherous if you don’t time it right to be going with the tide, then the currents can run up to 5 knots. Aided by the current, we were motoring along at 11.5 knots at one point. The underwater terrain is very uneven with depths from 34 to 107 ft.; Mill Rock and two islands in the East River contribute to the turbulence and whirlpools. This old R.R. bridge really WAS a “bridge over troubled water!”

After passing under the Throggs Neck Bridge (love these names), we were in Long Island Sound. The Sound is 90 nautical miles long and 20 miles wide at the widest point. At the western end there is an 8 to 10 ft. tidal exchange but less than 3 feet as you travel east. There were an amazing number of sailboats out on this breezy Saturday afternoon. Usually we feel like we’re outnumbered by powerboats but definitely not in this area.


We came into Manhasset Bay near Port Washington. We were able to hook onto one of the town’s mooring balls which is free the first two nights and $25 thereafter. There isn’t a dinghy dock that you can use for more than 15 minutes so the mode of transportation to shore is the water taxi. There are public restrooms but no shower or laundry facilities.

Kyle and Lizzie drove out on Sunday to take a sail but it was a rainy day so that didn’t happen. We took advantage of having a car and did errands and some grocery shopping. There was a hot and heavy game of UNO before dinner onboard. (I don’t have a shot of Kyle sans cap but you might notice he got a major haircut since we saw him a week earlier).

The next day we ended up anchoring in Oyster Bay. It was a motor day as the winds were calm until mid-afternoon when we were nearly at our destination. This seems to be the pattern around here. This was the sunset from our anchor spot.


This is one of the oyster boats we saw in Oyster Bay (imagine that) and a closer view of the workers harvesting the oysters.


We also spent 3 nights on the Connecticut side but more on that later. All for now from the Free Library in Port Jefferson, NY. (that really is the name of the library!)