Lockport and Lock 32

5/31/12: We find the Erie Canal and there's a tour boat motoring along it – this is so cool!   We'll be just like that boat within the next two months.  We are trying to follow the canal in the Tracker and have to keep crossing bridges and going back and forth, from one side of the canal to the other in order to find roads that parallel the water. The old tow path, used by mules to pull the barges, still runs along the canal; today it is a walking and biking path, with an occasional wooden picnic table. We spot a tall-necked, Canada Goose in the canal with a string of adolescent goslings paddling in a line behind her

Our route takes us away from the canal and then back to it, and we pass apple orchards and wooden barns built on top of stone-walled, first-floor root cellars.  When we are in towns, on the curbs we see big garbage cans on wheels - many are bright pink with breast cancer awareness ribbons painted on their sides, something we have only seen in New York.  Now we are back along the canal and come to a turning basin where the barges used to turn around, and we cross the canal on a one-lane bridge.

At Rochester, Conrad finds the spot where the Genese River and the Erie Canal intersect, and we take a stroll through a park and along the water.  There is a dredge on the river dredging a navigation channel.  

Dredge on Genese River

The old tow path we are walking on goes over its own bridge, which was a way for the mules pulling the barges along the canal to cross over the Genese River.  

 Old Erie Canal Tow Path on Bridge Over Genese River

Now we are off to find an actual  lock and see how it works

Back on the road, Conrad heads for the town of Lockport, the location of Lock 32 on the canal.  It's just dumb luck; we arrive right as a boat is headed for the lock.

 

Boat Approaching Lock 32

We climb a viewing platform with a bird's eye view of Lock 32. There are giant gates in the water at each end of the lock, along with big  

Erie Canal, Lock 32: Lockkeeper's Hut at Upper Left, Gates to Upstream Canal to Right of Hut, Navy Blue Boxes with Yellow Trim at Top Right & Left Contain Machinery to Open Sluices That Let Water into the Lock, Bollard at Mid-Right, Ladder Rail at Mid-Left.

bollards for barges and larger boats to run lines around, machinery to open the sluices that let water into and out of the lock, a hut for the lockkeeper, ladders down the inside walls of the lock, and cables running from the top to the bottom of the lock walls.







Boat Enters Lock from Downstream





Downstream Lock Gates Closing







Water Bubbling Up from Ports on Lock Bottom 



Deck Hand Holding Boat Against Lock Wall

 

Upstream Lock Gates Opening




Boat Leaving Dock Headed Upstream



The lockkeeper comes out of his hut, looking like a tiny, toy man against the massive lock setting, and opens the downstream lock gates. The boat in the canal is on the same level as the water in the lock, and maneuvers through the gates into the lock.  It's a very small boat in a very big lock; we can't even see the boat once it is hugged against the lock wall below us – some of those old barges must have been hecka' huge to fill the entire lock!

The downstream lock gates close slowly against the water; the upstream ones are already closed.  The lockkeeper opens the hidden sluice gates, and the lock begins to fill with water, gravity-fed from the upstream canal level, flowing in through ports in the bottom of the lock, and bubbling at the surface.  As the water rises, we can see the boat floating up with the water.  It is tethered by a rope that a deck hand on the boat has looped from the boat and around a cable that is permanently attached at the top and bottom of the lock wall. Conrad asks the deck hand whether all the locks have cables to loop onto (no, some have lines secured only at the top of the wall), whether all the locks are bottom fed (yes), and other canal questions. 

The water level rises quickly and the boat floats higher and higher until the water in the lock is at same level as the upstream part of the canal. Then the lockkeeper opens the upstream gates, and the boat glides out of the lock.  The boat looked so little in the lock, and our boat is even smaller, but I still can't wait until we get to do that in the Flussmaus!  

Lock 32 from the Viewing Platform



There is some history of the locks on display panels, describing how the Erie Canal mirrored the history of the industrialization of our country.  When the first part of the canal opened in 1825, it was considered the engineering marvel of the 19th century.  It spurred the first great westward movement of American settlers, and made New York City the preeminent commercial city in the United States.  By the 1960's, with the growing competition from railroads and highways and the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway in 1959, commercial traffic on the canal declined dramatically.  Today it is primarily used for recreation and by tourists like us.

Our next stop is one of the Finger Lakes, Lake Cayuga, to see if there are yacht clubs where we can anchor,  and boatworks for possible winter storage of the boat.  Lake Cayuga is one of the smaller Finger Lakes and we only see one yacht club (the Red Jacket Yacht Club) and one boat yard.  It is a lovely, largish lake, where it looks like many people have second homes and others come to camp or stay in motels or rentals for family vacations.  Still, there is nothing unusual that draws us to Lake Cayuga, and we decide that unless our research reveals sights and accomodations more enticing than what we see, we will probably skip the Finger Lakes and head straight for the Great Lakes.

Back on our way through central New York, there are more farms, more apple orchards, thickly wooded hills, and very steep roads up those hills to challenge our little Tracker.  We arrive at the town of Cazenovia (established in the 1700's) on Cazenovia Lake - very swank with mansions and other, merely very large, houses; there are high-end stores, such as a “The Pate Shop,” in town - quite a ritzy spot.

We are in the Hudson River Valley!  And, it is on to Latham (near Albany) to see where the Erie Canal begins from the Hudson River.  We drive over two, one-lane bridges to get to the canal administration offices and to the very first lock of the Erie Canal.  The lock is in the town of Waterford, named for the colonial ford that was across the river there.  It is late and things are closed, but we'll be back in the morning.