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End of Week 4

Hi Everyone!

It's Friday night and we are sitting in Catskill, NY on the Hudson River. What an inspirational view coming down the Hudson! It makes the Hudson River School Artists' work really come to life for me. When I taught my students how to paint watercolor landscapes a couple years ago, we looked at several examples from that time period. At the little library and museum in Canajoharie, NY (another one of our stops), I saw several more original examples of these artists' work. What a little gold mine find that was!

We landed in Waterford, NY, on Thursday marking the end of our trek through the Erie Canal. I say "landed" because the last five locks that you go through are called "The Flight of Five." They got their name because you have to descend approximately 150 feet within those locks! As we approached Lock #6 (the first of the five), we found ourselves eye level to above the tops of the trees facing us from the banks of the Mohawk River a few miles away! I felt a bit like Christopher Columbus as it looked like we were about to fall off the face of the Earth. After dropping 35', we were immediately upon Lock #5. This continued through 4, 3 and 2. The dams or spillways next to the locks were tremendous! It is understandable how the power of the flooding waters back in June '06 wiped out entire lock houses, bridges and the locks themselves. Incredible! We discovered there is no Lock #1 or Lock #31...it makes one wonder what were those lock builders doing on those days that they forgot how to count. Hmmmm.

No matter that we had already gone through twenty-nine locks, I was still a tad apprehensive about the big drop. Allow me to explain this locking process from "my" perspective. You call the lock operator (tender, master...whatever) and let them know that you are approaching, in our case eastbound, and ask permission to enter. You wait for the green light and move in. Most of the time it has been just Presto and Manatee. It gets a little hairier for me when there are other boats locked in with us, especially if they are opposite us and I have to really tug to hold in the bow. I have a tendency to move at creep speed when at the helm, and Bac is always telling me to move a little faster. I leave the driving up to him...like that was ever a big question for him! Next, I scurry up to the bow and slip on my nifty, bright robin's egg blue rubber gloves with cuffs (compliments of our sweet Blossom)...you need cuffs so the canal slime doesn't run down to your elbows. Then, I grab my boat hook in order to snag the long rope or cable that Jeff yells pretty much at the last minute, "Grab that one, San!" These lines and cables are only weighted at the bottom, and very slack. Finally, I grab my boat brush handle to fend off the canal wall so the spreaders won't hit. I know you are asking, "Why the boat hook and the handle?" Well, that's because if one gets excited and pushes too hard on the boat hook, the hook can snap off. Enough said.

Once holding onto a line with the bow an appropriate distance away from the wall (hmm, hmm) and Jeff at the stern with Manatee pulled in to rest on the fender board, we wait for the operatortendermaster ("OTM") to close the gates and pull the plug, so to speak. Now, this may sound like it goes pretty smoothly, right? Well, not always so. You have to include the "Hatch Factor." For example, Hatch running to the bow faster than Mommy because he can scoot under the spreaders and tie downs so he can get to the smelly, slimily blue things that are so much fun to chew! Isn't this a fun game? By the time I get them away from him, I have to quickly get in position to get the line or cable which sometimes involves me stretching over the lifelines until I can't stretch one more inch to snag the sucker! I only missed one time that Jeff had to re-dock the boat....so there!

I think I'm ready only to see out the corner of my eye Hatch in mid leap as he jumps off the boat onto the top of the lock wall while Jeff is yelling, "San, call the dog!" This action usually incites Aunt Blossom and Uncle Steve into whistling and yelling for the dog, too, and finally after several curses, not always under mine or Jeff's breath, he jauntily hops back onboard. We tried putting him below going through the locks after our first experience on #35, but the howling and the barking is unbearable, like doggy hari kari, and the lock operatortendermaster gives us really strange looks. We were determined to use our expert dog whispering techniques to make him understand the process and his part in it...or lack of his part in it!

Sometimes the lock OTM's will stop and talk with us while they make their long, slow walk to the opposite end of the lock where they start lowering the water. Most are the friendliest, nicest people ever! They want to know where we are from, where we are going, they talk about their own pets, the weather, vacation plans, some have even asked if we need to hold up a minute to give the "cute puppy" some grass time. Of course there are those times of TMI, like I don't really have to know what one guy's dog does in his lap when he gets home from work, or why someone has gained so much weight, or that it happens to be one OTM's first day operating the deepest lock in the canal! Geez.

What we learned is that the previous lock operatortendermaster calls ahead to alert the next lock operatortendermaster that two sailboats, or whoever, are approaching eastbound or westbound. We also learned that if boats, certainly not us in a motoring sailboat, get their too fast or faster than expected, the lock operatortendermaster won't open right away because he/she knows that that person was speeding! There is some justice in the world! An additional silver lining is that Jeff takes advantage of all of these lulls in time to take photographs. Captain Confidence is jumping on and off the boat, shooting pictures of Manatee and Presto, he's running to the end of the lock to take pictures from over the lock doors looking down, and what really makes me crazy is when he's lying on his back on the deck of the boat to get the perfect vantage point to capture that sinking sensation! He even does this when we are actually going down!! Meanwhile, I'm white knuckled from holding the spreaders off the wall and trying to keep Hatch cornered on the bow between my knees.

The descent is usually pretty slow. This gives one plenty of time to closely observe the different kinds of canal slime clinging to the walls. Colors vary according to wall type, but are typically a deep shiny green or a brown, rusty mud color. I have to admit, I like the concrete/stone walls best. There are lots more interesting textures, values of green and crawling critters. The steel walls are more flaky brown scum, with no mussels or sharp objects to rip up your hands. Did I forget to mention the lower you go, the slipperier it gets? One could even loose hold of a line because it was so slippery if she wasn't really careful! No reason to panic, if there is a trusty boat hook handy! (Uncle Steve happened to catch that action and thought that it was pretty humorous. There was no laughing onboard Manatee, however.) This down time is also a chance for Hatch to mosey back to Dad and make nice with a few licks to his sweaty forehead and ears. Hatch found the boom a perfect place to sit and park his rear and still be able to paw Dad's shoulder for attention that he obviously feels he is lacking.

I must admit at the end, I was getting pretty cocky about my locking prowess, also. I found that if you got really bored with staring at the slime, you could write notes to Blossom in it! She cracked up the first time she saw "Hi, P R E S T O !" scrolled on the wall. One time when Presto entered a lock ahead of us, I yelled to Blossom that I expected a note. Her reply was that it she didn't think she could do it and if she could, it would read, "H E L P!"

Once all the water is out, the lock doors creak and grunt open, the swirlies shoot out the door and with one big push, we're off and moving. We call our thanks to the OTM and he reaches for his radio. He's probably saying to the next OTM, "Hey, you got this hysterical blonde and a crazy barking mutt that's a leaper heading your way...and watch out for Captain Camera Bug... make sure he's on the boat before you let it down." Thank heavens no one is making a documentary of our canal experience. I can imagine if they did, it would have those fuzzy rectangles floating over our faces and all the soundtrack wiped out with bleeps, at least on the female crew!

All in all, it was an amazing experience and I'm actually looking forward to doing it again at the end of our trip, it's all uphill! For right now, though, weather permitting, we get our mast stepped tomorrow morning. Dinner onboard Manatee tomorrow night to celebrate Bacon the Blade's birthday! Then, we're off to see the Lady in New York City! Can't wait!

Keep in touch...love and miss,

Sandy

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