Trent - Severn Waterway

We left the Erie Canal system and traveled the Oswego Channel which is 24 miles long.  Here is a picture of the bridge across the canal.  You can only pull into the lock part way until the water goes down, then you can clear the fixed bridge!

Well we have had a wonderful time exploring on the Trent - Severn Waterway.  It was a lot of work because it has 45 locks.  Some of them are hydraulic, but the majority of them are run manually.  The lock staff are super and help with anything you need.  It kept us really busy on some of the days because we would go through 6 to 8 locks in one day.  You don't travel a lot of miles, but you are busy.  The locks are open from 9 to 4 so you have to plan around that also. 

At the end of the day, you can pay a camping fee to tie on the wall either above or below the lock.  It really is a great system.

As your boat travels from the USA into Canada or visa versa, you have to check in with customs.  The boat arrives at a designated marina and the captain takes all of the necessary items like passports, boat registration, insurance documentation, etc. with him to check in.  We checked in at Kingston, Ontario.  Here is a picture of Erwin calling in our information.

While the captain is calling in to report, the boat flies a yellow quarantine flag.  Then after you receive a clearance with customs, then the US boats fly a courtesy flag with the familiar maple leaf.  Here is our flags before and after.

We stayed at Fraser Marine in Trent to get our provisions and we had a lovely free concert in the park.  Here in Canada they have free concerts by local musicians just about every week.

We were greeted as all boaters by this welcome sign at the beginning of the Trent-Severn waterway.

The lock systems are for the most part manually operated.  They do have some that are hydraulic, but this is a picture of the lock man opening the lock gates.  They push this and it reminds you of when you pushed a merry-go-round as a kid.  It keeps the lock personnel busy all day.

One of the interesting features of this waterway is that you pay a fee to use the lock system and then if you want to you pay a camping fee and stay on the wall at the locks.  Here is our boat at Campleford.

We traveled on to Peterborough and anchored at Little Lake.  Our cruising guide gave us the spot and told us to anchor clear of the spray from the waterfall.  It actually was over 70 feet high and all lite up at night in multi-colors.  It was beautiful and a nice surprise.

There are two lift locks in this system, one in Peterborough and one at Kirkfield.  There are two large pans and they are counter-balanced.  You drive the boat into the pan and the hydraulic lift then moves the pans in opposite positions.  So your boat goes up or down just like a lock.  It is like a giant bathtub.  It is also kind of scary with all that water and the boat at a high level and moving to the low level.

Here is Erwin talking to one of the other boats in the bathtub.  Look over his shoulder and see how high up we are!

We also met some great folks from Canada.  As we traveled through locks we talk to the other boats while the lock is moving you up or down.  We met Dave and Julie and talked with them through several locks.  We then stayed on the wall in Bobcaygeon and they had a few friends that joined them as well.  We stayed a couple of days and they were so kind to invite us over and have a few drinks and some food.  It was such fun getting to know all of them.  So here are our new Canada friends - Dave and Julie, Mark and Tammie, and Bill and Deb.

As we travel further north, the wildlife changes.  Here are a pair of loons with their young ones.

One of the places we stopped was Kirkfield.  Here is our boat on the wall there.

One of the most exciting locks was the "Big Chute"  It is a railway system that moves your boat out of the water and over the land, then back to the water again.  Can you imagine?  We thought it would be scary, but it was really cool.  The lock staff are so well trained that they make it easy.  Here is a picture of the boat as they are about to pick us up out of the water and then a shot of the rail system as we left.  The boat is carried on the yellow slings that you see.

We then traveled through one of the interesting bridges.  This one is called the Hole in the Wall.  It is like threading a needle.

The scenery changed again.  Now the markers are on the rocks, really.  The channels are narrow and you looked for those big, hard, rocks under the water and stay clear of them.

OK, that is it for now.  We are headed to the Georgian Bay and then the North Channel.  









Erie Canal & Oswego Canal - New York Canals

As we finish the Hudson River and head up to the Erie Canal and New York Canal systems we passed by this bridge, as you can see Hurricane Irene (last year) left it's mark on this river system.

Even after the Hurricane the Erie Canal was damaged badly and we did meet several boaters who had to take alternate routes because they could not use the Erie Canal last year.  We are happy to report that the Erie Canal has been re-opened and is a great system to travel in by boat.

This was the sign that greeted us as we entered the Erie Canal.

We stopped at the visitor center in Waterford New York and spent the night there.  We picked up our permit to travel the Erie Canal, walked around town, and had the worst pizza ever!  The second picture is the old canal system at lock 1 in Waterford.

This is the boat sitting at the top of a lock (second picture), we will be going down in this lock, but the view at the top is great.  The first picture is looking down at the gates which are at the end of the lock.  You can see they are tall and impressive especially when you think about all of the water they are holding back.

They also have control gates along the locks, they control the amount of water flowing through the canal.  The other picture is a boat going into lock 7.  This boat is larger than our boat, but you can see that the chambers in the locks are large.

This next picture is one of the sailboats along the Erie Canal.  They all put their mast down in order to travel under the bridges which are fixed (they do not open) and are about 20 feet high. 

When you purchase your permit you can tie up to the free walls along the canal.  We tied up at this Lock (I think it was number 12) and it was quiet and secluded.  After super the volunteer fire department showed up.  They brought all of there equipment and practiced drafting the water from the canal to the trucks.  It was great entertainment!

This is one of the many dams along the Erie Canal.

We also encountered this bridge which was located in the lock.  As you travel westbound you can only enter the lock to this point as the bridge is fixed and only 2 feet tall!  After the lock drops the other 20 feet then the boats can go under it.

After we traveled the eastern half of the Erie Canal, we entered the Oswego Canal.  Some of the boaters go through the Western half of the Erie Canal and then travel Lake Erie.  We choose to go the Oswego Canal and then Lake Ontario.  At the town of Oswego there is a wall to tie up to.  Here is a picture of our boat (the last one on the right).  As you can see, many of the boaters use the walls.

The next set of pictures is the river in Oswego which runs parallel to the canal.  The last picture is the view of the last lock in the Oswego canal, looking out toward Lake Ontario.

We also hiked up to the Fort at Oswego.  Even though the fort was closed the day we were there, we took as couple of pictures.

This last picture is the lighthouse at Lake Ontario.  We made a successful crossing of this large body of water (of course, we watched the weather for a favorable day).

As we crossed Lake Ontario we entered into Canada.  Of course, all citizens must check in with customs even when you travel by boat.  The procedure is to hoist up a quarantine flag that is yellow, then the captain is the only one allowed off of the boat.  He will either go to the customs office, or in this case, use the designated phone to call customs.

The captain calling in to customs.

Well all went went with our call to customs as we had all our paperwork in order.

We also had a bit of bad luck at Lock 13.  (hmm).  As we entered the lock they had a construction crew working on damage to the dam.  The dam is located right next to the lock.  The gates next to the lock were open and causing a lot of turbulence.  Erwin has been handling boats for 50 years, but the current and the wind slammed our boat into the lock wall.  The lock master felt as bad as we did.  We suffered some damage, but it only scrapped the fiberglass.  The teak cap rail did not come out so good.  We will be doing repairs after our return to Michigan.  Here is a picture of the damaged side and the side that is good.



We will be traveling in Canada for the next few weeks.  The first adventure will take us through the Trent-Severn Canal system.  Stay tuned for the next chapter.