Cruising the Erie Canal

 Greetings once again, y'all!

It seems like a long time since my last post, but only 5 actual days and lots of slow rolling hours trawling along.  After leaving Peekskill, we continued north amidst the onset of the Canadian fire smoke.  The area along the Hudson River was gorgeous, but the pictures were disappointing because of the haziness.  Hopefully we can get some pictures that will do it justice on the way home!

Our next overnight was anchored outside Kingston, NY (first capitol city of NY apparently).  Charming town but many of the cute shops didn't open until later in the week.  Enjoyed a nice dinner and walk around  town (and into the neighboring town of Esopus briefly).  Lots of hills to get used to walking!


After anchoring in the Hudson River, we took the dinghy into the town of Kingston.  
Historic Rondout Lighthouse in background.


 Celebrating the lighthouse...

The waterfront of Kingston - picture taken from nearby bridge. 
Our dinghy is just just to the left of the center of the pic BTW.



Following that, we ventured to the city of Troy, NY and stayed at the Municipal City Marina for the night.  As luck would have it, there were several great restaurants by the marina AND there was a live band playing 80's music right there as well!  Fun evening, and we caught up to one of the boats from our home marina (Midnight Star) who we're still traveling with now.




Cool section of downtown Troy, NY 

 


I couldn't resist sending our son, Troy lots of funny pics (sorry, Troy!!!) 


Hazy pic of the Troy waterfront / municipal marina 



After departing Troy the next morning, we traversed our first (of MANY) locks, which I will talk more about in a little bit.  After a very short traveling day, we stopped in Waterford, NY which sits at the eastern end of the NY canal system and also is the "fork in the road" to either head west on the canals or north towards Lake Champlain (the SouthEast corner of The Triangle Loop!!!!).  Very charming town and beautiful part of the country for sure!!!  We were able to meet up with some new friends (from our sailboat charter in the BVI a few months ago) who live nearby.  Great local restaurant, delicious local ice cream shop, and a personal tour of the local sights.  Thanks so much to Mike and Tracy - we hope they can join us for a bit on our way back through town!


The literal starting point of The Triangle Loop

 





After leaving Waterford this morning, we traveled a total of about 22 miles westward on the Erie Canal and traversed 5 more locks (whew!!!).  A lock is an ingenious contraption that manages to literally raise (or lower) boats to different elevations.  The NY canal system does not even use any pumps to assist, but it's surprisingly efficient.  Using a lock sounds pretty cool, but it is actually relatively uneventful and anticlimactic.  One basically pulls one's boat into the lock chamber (with high concrete walls and steel doors at both ends) and use whatever methods one can to temporarily tether to the side.  Once the doors are closed, the water from the higher side is gravity drained, which slowly raises (or lowers) the boat to the new elevation.  Hopefully you can get a feel for the process in the pictures below.  After transiting 5 locks today, we were raised to approximately 200 feet above sea level!!!  Many more locks are actually in our future for this trip.....

Another sweatshirt day unfortunately..... 

 

Coming up the side wall of a lock 


Almost to the top of the lock wall!!!! (looking backwards toward stern of boat) 


Lock maneuver completed - heading out after the doors opened 


Anchoring now in a peaceful bend in the canal just west of Schenectady.  Some brief storms passed through, so we're just enjoying the peaceful, natural beauty of the area tonight.  Tomorrow will be more locks and moving further westwardly.

"Low Bridge, Everybody Down".....




Oceanus is holding her own, with no (known) issues at the moment.  It's a common joke that something is always broken on a boat - you just may not know it yet, which is most likely true for us too LOL.

Be well, friends and family - truly wish y'all were here!!!!!!!!  Until next post......































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