Oswego
On Sunday, June 19th, we pulled out of Brewerton headed to Oswego. Again, another bluebird NY weather day. We were excited to have Sue’s brother, Mike, and his wife, Carol, join us for a short leg to Phoenix, where their daughter, Dawn, would pick them up and drive them back to Brewerton to fetch their car. They were able to experience the last Erie Canal lock we would pass through, E23. We would have 7 more locks to get to our port at the wall between Locks O7 and O8. We then passed by Three Rivers Junction, where the decision is to either continue heading west on the Erie or up the Oswego River to Lake Ontario. We pulled dockside at Phoenix and said our goodbyes as we headed into the O1 lock to begin our descent down. Going down in a lock for some reason is easier. The cruise was pretty smooth until we got to lock O5. Lock O5 was not a real problem, but as we were leaving the lock, the lock tender warned us about high winds at lock O6. Well, what he failed to tell us is when we exited lock O5, the spillway dumped right back into the river on the port side. It was easy to see, so I put the nose of Next Chapter at a 30-degree attack angle along with pulling back on the port engine. Well, good plan. As we hit the crosscurrent, we went straight as hoped, but the second we got halfway through, there was an unseen eddy that then pushed us hard to port right at the spillway! Yikes. Well, a little quick maneuvering and we averted going up the spillway, read very bad direction, and continued up the Oswego. When we entered O6 lock, the winds were blowing across the lock at 20+ knots. Keeping Next Chapter up against the wall was quite an effort. But thanks to great work by the Admiral, we got through the lock unscathed. A number of the other loopers we spoke to in Oswego had more harrowing stories to tell. PS that’s what Docktails are really about, debriefing of the day’s travel. No, really, it has nothing to do with the adult beverages that are consumed. Those are really medicinally purposed. LOL. Well, we passed through lock O7, and we were at our intended port. As we looked, we saw the lock wall was completely full of loopers. Fortunately, I rubbed the Farrell Lucky Horseshoe, and a boat pulled off just as we were looking.
We also wanted to comment on how well maintained the paint was on each of the locks. All painted the signature NYS blue and yellow. One lock we were greeted by a rather jovial lock tender that was as friendly as they come. Once inside the chamber, he closed the back gate and then, on his way to the other end to release the water, he stopped by and had a chat.
Told us all about the Baltimore Orioles he was feeding, not to mention the hummingbirds and how the two do not coexist well, as the Orioles always want to steal the hummingbird nectar. Well, he finally made his way to the valve to release the water, and we were on our way. In total, that day we negotiated 8 locks on our way to Oswego.
We had fun exploring the town on our bikes and getting caught up on some boat chores. Going through the locks is dirty business as the slime and algae transfer from the ropes and fenders onto the boat. Clean up on Isle 4! So the admiral was pretty busy. We stocked up on beer and booze as we were told that beer is over $60 per case in Canada. Ouch! We stayed the extra day as the winds on Lake Ontario were forecast to be out of the southwest, which meant a beam sea. For those of you not up on the boating lingo, just know that beam sea means side-to-side rocking boat, which makes the captain and crew feel very bad. So we spent another sunny day at port exploring an old NY town.
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