The Summer of 99 Locks

The Erie Canal has finally opened.  The opening date, June 5, tied the latest date the Canal has ever opened.  We're off to an interesting year.

Ready to leave from Brewerton

This year we will be cruising from Brewerton, NY through Lake Ontario, the 1000 Islands in the St. Lawrence River, the Rideau Canal in Canada, Ottawa, Montreal,  the Richelieu Canal (also in Canada), and Lake Champlain before returning to Brewerton for another winter's storage.  As always, if any of that sounds interesting, guests are welcome.  Just give us a call.


There are lots of locks in that float plan.  Jim figures we will go through 99 locks during the course of this year, from very small ones with little lift to commercial docks designed for ocean-going ships that travel up the St. Lawrence seaway to the commercial ports on the Great Lakes.  We'll take pictures, time permitting, to give you a sense of what locking is like.  

View from inside a lock

The process of locking, in the US, involves calling the lock tender on the radio to let him know you want to go through.  When the lock is ready for your boat, he tells you to come in.  Jim drives the boat into the lock and I stand at the bow.  I reach out and grab a line hanging down the side of the lock, or loop one of our lines around a cable on the side of the lock wall, depending on the lock.  Then while I hold the boat near the wall, Jim leaves the engine in neutral and goes to the stern to grab another lock line.  We both hold the boat close to the wall, while making sure the fenders we carry on the side keep the boat off the wall (lock walls are filthy), pushing the boat away from the wall as necessary using boat hooks.  After the lock fills (or empties depending on if we're going up or down), Jim drops his line and goes back to the wheel.  Once he has control of the boat I drop the last line and we move out of the lock.


We understand the process in Canada is a little different because Canadian lock tenders don't have radios and they want you to turn off your engines in the lock itself.  I'll let you know once we start up the Rideau Canal.