Waterford and Amsterdam NY

High water levels from recent storms (8 inches in one night) made the Hudson River a challenge. Lots of prop eating logs, barrels, and debris.  Just when you want to put the autopilot on, another big floater comes along as you zig zag up the river.  It made the days of dodging crab pots seem easy.

Our first lock in a while was in Troy.  Pretty powerful after the recent rains.  Water at the Troy Lock was moving at close to 5 knots!!

We got to the canal sign and made a left turn and we were on the Erie Canal at the Waterford wall.

In case some of you have forgotten about locking; you approach the lock, hold the ropes or loop a line around a pipe or cable, the doors shut and we are heading UP at this part of the canal so the waters rise and then we go through the open doors at the other side of the lock and we are at the water level again.

Even kayaks do it!

Canal barge clawing the trees in the water onto the barge.

We are now at Waterford where the Erie canal starts, super excited to start this phase of the trip, 351 miles to Buffalo.

Everything connected to the NYS canal system is painted Blue and Yellow (golden yellow) and is spotless. 100 year old locks are maintained daily,  it’s like every lockmaster is trying to make their lock better than the next one.  The Blue and gold tugboats, barges and dredges are also spotless.

We locked 9 locks from Waterford to Amsterdam Riverlink Park, met a new group of folks to travel with for a few days and enjoyed this beautiful, lush green part of the loop.  The dams are incredible and we are enjoying the old towns.