July 18, 2011 - Haverstraw, NY to Waterford, NY

Another long day, 7 1/2 hours from Haverstraw, NY to Waterford, NY, the crossroads of the route to the Erie canal and the route to Lake Champlain. Mixed weather coming up the Hudson with intermittent rain and wind behind us, but of course against the current. We decided rather than sit in a marina in the rain we'd press on to the entrance to the Erie Canal. The past three days have been grueling, 21 running hours, almost as much as the drive to Florida.

West Point

Tomorrow we will get set up for the Erie lock system which means getting the fender boards set up. We had to go through the only Federal lock to get here today but did it with "naked" fenders, sounds sexier than it was...

The Federal Lock at Troy, NY - 1 of 100

We stopped for fuel in Coeyman, NY, and ran into some people coming back from the Lake Champlain Lake and the Champlain Canal who hit debris in the canal and destroyed a propeller, and another guy who ran aground near Champlain Lock 4 where it was supposed to be 12 feet deep and bent two propeller shafts. Both major repairs before heading for NYC. They said there was still a great number of floating objects in the Champlain canal after the lake was over flood stage this spring. Many marinas and state parks were under water in May and we're hoping that a month from now when we come through Lake Champlain and the lock system back home, things will be back to normal. The lake was back under flood level last week but  people said the water was so high during the flood stage that houses were underwater and doors and all kinds of debris were floating around.

"Blue Belle" at the Waterford, NY wall for the night

Full set of pictures are at: https://picasaweb.google.com/golphinut/201107BlueBelle02?authuser=0&feat=directlink
Click on any of the photos above to enlarge them.