It runs essentially east to west, so favorable winds would be from the east and we were in luck with light winds from the southeast. With my weather officer on sabatical Mark took on the task of checking internet weather. I was assured that there was no bad weather anywhere near our path and we were good to go.
Seas were calm as we cruised along at our normal 2000 RPM's, which was yielding right around 9 miles an hour. We were looking at a 2 1/2 hour trip. About 30 minutes in the skies started to change.
Mark rechecked the weather and insisted it was going to be to our south. Another 30 minutes and we were committed to reaching the other side. Another weather check from a different site and all of a sudden I was told there was a weather advisory, which included a thunderstorm warning with the possibility of hail. Winds picked up and we could see rain a ways off our port bow. It was clear we were going to be hit by another storm. I'm sure my official weather officer would have insisted on staying in port and not attempting the lake crossing. I increased our RPM's to 2800 and soon we were zipping along at over 12 miles an hour. A little rain started, but just for a few minutes as we were now starting to outrun the storm. Ron was not taking any chances and lashed himself to the deck.
Within an hour we were back in the canal and were spared more storm damage. We were in need of a pump out and possibly some fuel, so we stopped at a marina right on the canal. Their pump out was broken and they were out of diesel, but we saw a couple that had been at the Albany Yacht Club for a couple of days, Stan and Barbara on a trawler named Grogger. They came aboard as it started to rain and Stan told us how they had gotten caught in the storm a few days ago and just like us, their bimini was ripped off and one of the infrastructure pieces hit him in the head. He even thought for a minute Barbara had gone over board. He also told how his auto pilot had malfunctioned and he nearly ran into the shore. They were leaving the boat, which had to be hauled out to fix the auto pilot, and were going to be gone for a couple of weeks. He wasn't even sure which way he was going, except he wasn't doing the western half of the Erie Canal. We thought we might see each other again around Chicago at the end of summer.
The route of the Erie Canal did not always go across Oneida Lake, it used to follow a river through Syracuse to the south of the lake. In the early 1900's a lot of the canal was rebuilt and the route changed, which shortened the total distance from 363 miles to todays 340. You can still get to Syracuse by water.
Because of our late start and waiting for the rain we were going to have to go later than normal to make Baldwinsville, which had free docks and there were a few restaurants near the canal. I had been to B'ville, as the locals call it, a few years ago when I visited a Budweiser brewery and warehouse nearby to look at a system they had installed. I had stayed at a hotel that was converted from a paper mill and is right on the canal. When there I had imagined coming back through on a boat some day. The 72 miles we covered were the most so far on the canal leg.
This was Friday night and there was a festival going on in the park next to the lock. We found out there would be fireworks at dark. We tied the boat to the wall below the lock and walked over to the bridge and had a perfect view of the fireworks. Dinner was at the all night diner in town that we liked so much we went back for breakfast before leaving on Saturday.
I knew from studying the charts that we were going into a stretch of many bridges with clearances of less than 17 feet, which was our air draft before ripping the masthead light off back on the Potomac. None the less we were going to be too high. The first one we came to was charted at 15 feet, but we approached slowly and easily made it under. Unlike the ICW there are no water level sight guages on these bridges and even the chart states not to trust the information.
I talked to the lockmaster at the next lock and found out that water levels are different between locks, so apparently the water level was lower at that bridge. He also said the water level after his lock was a normal pool and we would probably have to lower our masthead at some point. It wasn't long after that lock that we approached a bridge charted at 16 feet. I came right up to it and Ron stood on the top of the upper helm seat and thought it was too close.
I backed up and we proceeded to lower the mast, which is hinged at the base. Two bolts were removed and supported it while proceeded under the bridge.
We then carefully laid it down and secured it to the back rail.
We came to several more bridges that would have been too low, but we are down to about 14 feet of air draft.
We had identified two potential stops for Saturday night and as we approached the first of the two we knew we were going to stay there.
They were setting up for fireworks and we slowed and talked to them. Fireworks were going to be at 10 PM. How lucky can we get, fireworks two nights in a row. We soon found out we could get even luckier. Lyons, NY had a nice write up in the guide book as they had just upgraded their canal front and had free tie up, free electric and free water. Plus the fire station was right next to the wall and the shower facilities were open to boaters. As we tied up a local man stopped by and told us that the town was having their annual peppermint festival. Peppermint was once a big crop in the area and there used to be a large peppermint oil producer in town that was world renowned and shipped all over the world using the Erie Canal to get their product to the port in New York. To top it all off there was a tractor parade starting at 6. It was already after 5, so a quick shower and we were off to the parade, just two blocks from the boat. There were lots of cool tractors and I took lots of pictures.
Ron grilled chicken before the fireworks.
Its hard to describe how good the fireworks were. Part of it was because we were able to get closer to where they were shooting them off than I have ever been. All three of us like to be as close as possible. So close that you can feel the explosions. We were very close. It was fantastic.
After the fireworks we went by the fire station where they were having an open house. We talked awhile to one of the volunteer fireman who told us there was a party at a local restaurant and we should come. Of course we went and when we found there was a cover charge, he came over and got us in for no charge. We felt like celebrities. Its going to be hard to top our stop in Lyons, NY.
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