What a Longggggg day, it was one of those days that everything seems difficult nothing major its the little stuff. But, we survived, yesterday the locks seemed to be easy, today they were more work, not that there was wind or rain but the current seemed to reek havoc today. We thought maybe it was just us having an off day and surely that may have been part of it. But when we FINALLY reached our destination for the day we asked Inconceivable (who we have been following ) how it went for them, they agreed it was a lonnngggg day, and the current along with the rope only locks (no cable or pipe) were tougher today. We travel through 7 more locks the last one of the day was the largest single lift on the Erie canal 40'. in all, lo we were lifted 105' total for the day. Directly after that we were at our destination for the evening Little Falls. We ordered up a pizza, ate in and called it a night.
Wed. June 29th
We traveled through only 3 locks today and were lifted a total of 57', we docked early today as the marina we are spending the night in tomorrow will not have room for us until then, tonight we are docked on a free wall at lock 21. We are now at the highest point on the Erie and tomorrow when we lock we will be locking down for the first time.
Thursday June 30th
Wow locking down is much easier and it was a very short day it took us only 2hours and 2 locks lowering us 50' total for the day, to get to our marina for the night. We are now at Sylvan Beach (mariners) it is located at the mouth of Lake Oneida. We had hoped to spend the 4th of July weekend here but they are booked up. NautiNell is here as well as 3 other loop boats. Inconceivable ended up at the Free Dock where they can stay for the weekend. Since they have small children aboard this is a nice place for a few days. There is a nice beach, an amusement park 100' away from the free dock along with 3 or 4 restaurants and bars. Just down the street is town with more restaurants and stores, its a nice little town a real throwback in time, very 1960's like.
As it turned out Jim managed to sweet talk a slip for the weekend for us, we are back in a cove with much smaller boats, we kind of stick out like a sore thumb here, and the entry was so skinny that we brushed trees to get in. Quite the sight, we are bow in and the bow it just resting on the sand but we have 4.5 feet of water under us. Mariners Landing is a marina/campground since we are in the cove we are with the seasonal campers a friendly bunch too. So, here we are until Tuesday morning along with NautiNell, fireworks are planned for Monday along with a antique car show and other activities planned as well.
I will post pictures when I can get them off Jims computer, we downloaded all the pictures onto his Apple then shortly after it decided not to work.
