Days 292 and 293 - Come and Find Out

Miles cruised 37, fuel purchased $0, slip fee $45, daily high temperature 86°f. We supassed 5,000 on our Loop Adventure today. Total miles cruised 5,023.

We spent two nights in Waterford, NY and cast off at 10:00 am on Tuesday for Amsterdam. We proceeded to enter the lift of five successive locks at the east entrance to the Erie Canal. We purchased our 10 day canal transit pass for $50 and were lifted 169′ in less then a mile. As you exit one lock you enter the next one. In total we transited 9 locks in one day. This is a new record for us. We might be able to beat this record when we transit the Trent Severn Canal in Canada. Photo by Priscilla.

It is a long way down and up in a 34′ lock. Photo by Priscilla.

In Waterford Ron and Paul’s restaurant is a trip back in time. This is THE breakfast place for all the locals. They have not raised prices since Roosevelt was president.

Waterford, NY has a historic marker indicating that the one of the houses was “built in 1802 by Samuel Stewart, Hudson River Sloop Owner, Civic Leader, legislator, general, Built of Dutch ballast brick. Reputed stop in ‘Underground Railroad.’ Historic visitors include Alexander Hamilton, General Lafayette, Henry Clay, Frederick Douglass, Horace Greeley and Tom Thumb.”

In 1849 P.T. Barnum made financial arrangements with Tom Thumb’s family to “show” their son in his circus freak show. Tom was a perfectly sized dwarf. He was soon dubbed “General Tom Thumb” by the age of 11. Barnum taught the doll-sized Tom Thumb to sing, dance and impersonate people. His popularity exploded, and he became Barnum’s biggest attraction.

Le Mutt de Le Mar pulled between us and a small boat. His boat is 42′ and the space was 44′. However, in front of us was an empty 250′ face dock. Why squeeze into a tiny space when the entire dock is empty?

Each lock provides the details on the distance to next lock and height above sea level. Photo by Priscilla.

On Wednesday we will cruise west 43 miles on the Erie Canal and transit 7 locks to get to Little Falls, NY.

Carl (Chef) Wooden – quote of the day.
“Watching a coast as it slips by the ship is like thinking about an enigma. There it is before you, smiling, frowning, inviting, grand, mean, insipid, or savage, and always mute with an air of whispering, “Come and find out”.”
― Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

Joseph Conrad (3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Polish-British writer regarded as one of the greatest novelists to write in the English language. He joined the British merchant marine in 1878, and was granted British nationality in 1886. Though he did not speak English fluently until he was in his twenties, he was a master prose stylist who brought a non-English sensibility into English literature. He wrote stories and novels, many with a nautical setting, that depict trials of the human spirit in the midst of an impassive, inscrutable universe.