Day 1 of the Erie Canal - Catskill to Lock 8

This morning we traveled from Catskill, NY though the first eight locks of the Erie Canal.  Leaving Catskill and heading back up the Hudson was beautiful 32 mile trip and reminded me of our side trip to Knoxville when it felt as if we were traveling though the mountains.  Once we arrived at Waterford we had heard they were having a steam boat festival and figured that they would not have any room on their wall for us with those big boats in.  Little did we know that they were little steam boats that were maybe 20 feet long and a bit wider than a canoe.  Seems we could have stopped by there after all.  Guess we will save that stop for next time!  As we came by Waterford we entered into the Federal Lock with two of the little steam boats and had a chance to chat with them a bit while we waited for the water to rise.  There were mostly wood boats the owners had made and installed steam engines on.  One had a couple whistles and was quite capable of playing a few songs for us though the next couple of locks which made us all smile.  I had been a bit nervous about doing the locks again.  Fortunately we have now been though about 50 locks in this boat coming down the inland river system from Chicago to Mobile and pulled right up to the bollards the first time making it look like we knew exactly what we were doing.

Once in the locks we talked to the operators and it seemed like most businesses these days they are still a bit under staffed and were only staying open until 5pm vs their posted operating ours that stated they would be open from 7am-10pm.  As it was about 5 the lock master  suggested we travel down to a local restraunt called Jumping Jacks to tie up to their wall.  Unfortunately the restaurant was doing a firework show that night which meant the river was full of small boats that were their to party and not paying much attention to us.  So we decided to look for an anchorage.  As we were coming up on what we thought might be a good spot for the night we decided to try calling the next lock in hopes that they might be open extended hours due to the fireworks.  We were in lock.  They responded and locked us right through lock 8.  Once we came though lock 8 we tied up to the wall, had dinner, and then were treated to our first firework show along the canal while be attacked by bugs.  Overall it was a good day and we had traveled one more lock then we did on our first trip.  We were looking forward to our next day in the canal.