Prepped and Ready for the Erie Canal

Sunday, September 11

Sunday we worked and worked and worked. Craig and Jo came to Buffalo and they helped us take down the sails, and the boom, and secure it all to the boat. They also drove us to get groceries and some diesel. They're so good to us!  Hopefully we will pay them back with a nice cruise aboard RC Wings in the BVIs..

We are exhausted again, but we are ready for them to take the mast down tomorrow. I'm hoping that will be problem free and we'll be on our way again. We'll see.

Monday, September 12

Here is our sailboat without its mast. Poor thing!  It looks like a narwhal!  Or a cute little unicorn!

This morning, around 9, we took RC Wings over to the place where they were taking down the mast. We can't go through the Erie Canal with the mast up due to the low bridges. Carey was quite stressed about these guys climbing all over our boat, but in the end they did a good job. Carey felt good that they followed his suggestions.  We didn't get out of there until after 2:00, though.  Another day with no lunch. Aarrrrggghhhh.  (My sister, Jeanie, says that's my pirate saying.)

We decided to stay another night at the Erie Basin Marina, because it was just too late to start the canal. We also had to call Customs using a videophone to obtain a cruising permit for the US. We called and spent over a half hour on the phone with a Customs lady, giving her all of our information. She said she would fax our permit momentarily. Forty five minutes later, no fax, so I called back. The man who answered said there was no woman there and he couldn't find any record of our call. (Yup, I'm having a day of aaarrrggghhh moments!). He took all of our info again and, lo and behold, we got our permit. Yippee!

Tomorrow morning we'll head for the canal. The Erie Barge Canal is a total distance of 310 NM (356.7 Miles or 574.1 KM) from Lake Erie to the Hudson River with 34 locks.  We are looking forward to this new adventure.


We finally got into the Erie Canal on Tuesday, September 13.

The first low bridge we had to go under was 17'. Gulp. We weren't sure how tall we were with our mast cradle so we crawled toward the bridge as carefully as possible. We cleared it by about 3', so we
are about 14' tall. Phew!

At 10:20, we reached our first lock: Black Rock L&D. We called the lockmaster and waited for the green light.  We were the only boat in there, and they said it was a gentle lock, so we went to the centre and waited for the lock to empty. It took about 10-15 minutes for the lock to empty and we were on our way.  Easy-peasy.

They say that there are no nautical charts of the Western Erie Canal, which is all the way from the Niagara River (just north of Buffalo at Tonawanda) to Three Rivers at the junction of the Oswego Canal. Our chartplotter seemed to be showing us enough detail, though, so we were feeling fine. Someplace between Tonawanda and Lockport, however, our chartplotter went from showing a charted canal to a skinny, squiggly blue line. Yikes!  It's a little unnerving to have no more charted

information about this area. We do have Skipper Bob's "Cruising the New York Canal System" guide, though which is very helpful for info about what we can expect around the bend--i.e., bridge heights, locks, lift bridges, towns, free docks, restaurants, etc.

The canal is quite lovely.  It's tree-lined in many areas, and is dotted with small towns, parks, bush, and marinas.  There is a bike/walking path that runs all the way from Buffalo to Albany, right across the state. (Our avid biker friends would love it!). The canal is not very wide or deep. We usually have about 20' on either side and the depth is usually around 11'. (We have a 6' draft, so we don't have a lot of room left.). The canal has lots of turns and twists, too, so we have to pay attention at all times.

Carey did his best to relax on the helm, though.

After going under a couple of 16' bridges, I reassessed our height to about 11'.  Since the lowest bridge seems to be about 15.5', we are fine.

At 3:20 p.m., we were at Mile 320, just past Lockwood lock. The lockmaster was very friendly. He checked our 10-day permit and offered helpful advice about locking through and where to stop for the night.  The canal lockmasters and bridgemasters finish work at 5:00 (off-season hours), so we will usually have to plan to dock by then, too. While we were waiting to be lowered in the lock, an older couple came right up to the gate to watch us. Turns out he is the owner of RCR Yachts (the company that took down our mast) in several locations in New York.  They were very friendly and chatty, but eventually my head was lower than their feet and they couldn't see me anymore, as our boat was being lowered in the lock.

Although the people were very friendly, Lockwood lock was no fun. The wind pushed us into the lock and our fenders scraped against the walls, catching in the holes. It was very difficult to keep the boat off the wall.

In our cruising careers, we can now say we've gone through the Welland Canal locks, the Sault Ste. Marie lock, the Black Rock lock at Buffalo, and the Erie Canal locks. That's a lot of locks!

We tied up to the wall in Middleport, NY for the night. The bridgemaster, Rusty, came out to greet us and to tell us where everything is in town, including the public restrooms, the laundromat, the restaurants and the police station. Nice guy.  On the wall, we could connect to 30 amp service. Free!  Love that. We ate ribs and blue cheese and bacon salad for dinner on the boat, then went for a short walk to the Main Street. On the way back, we met a 60ish man setting up his hammock (complete with bug net attached) between two trees.  He was biking from Oklahoma City to Maine or Boston. Pretty impressive. We loved his hammock!

We had an early night and were in bed by 10:00.  While I was trying to sleep, it crossed my mind that it was not a very secure spot.  The whole town could walk right by our boat.  Anyone with mischief on their minds could easily untie our lines and let us loose!  Not a good thought to sleep on!  However, in the morning, we were still securely tied to the wall.

Here are two maps showing our route from Buffalo to Albany.

Having a good day so far on Day 2. We'll stay in Spencerport tonight.