1st Day on the Erie Canal

We have spent our first night on the Erie Canal. We are tied up on the wall at Waterford, New York, Lock 2. Lock 1 is on the Hudson River at Troy; it’s called the Federal Lock. Every boat passes through it, whether it is going to the Champlain Canal or the Erie Canal. Today we begin making our way west through 23 locks to Three Rivers, then veering north on the Oswego Canal through 7 locks to Lake Ontario. This will take about 10 days, and Nelson is due to join us at some point.

Our “locking through” on the Federal Lock was not a pretty sight yesterday. We had plenty of fenders set up, and I grabbed the pole just fine. But it suddenly started raining, the red ball fell off the front fender, and Brian realized that the bow thruster creates turbulence in a confined space. We rescued the red ball using our 8-foot net, we figured out how to fend off using the boat-hooks, and we wiped up all the rainwater that came inside the boat. Today we have at least 8 chances to practice locking through, so we should be pretty good by the end of the day.

Three lines of storms rolled through after sundown yesterday. We were snug in our boat when the loudest thunder I have ever heard cracked directly overhead. I leaped up, wide-eyed and panic-stricken! Everything was fine, thank goodness, but a small Niagara Falls was pouring off the canal wall next to our neighboring boat. Farther up the canal, past lock 24, the canal is temporarily closed due to too much water, but so far our path is still open.

It is a beautiful, fresh, breezy morning here in Waterford and we are having a wonderful time on the Erie Canal.