Sunny Days: Let The Trip Begin

We left Winter Harbor on a beautiful morning and ran with Rahn de Vous to Phoenix, NY. This was about 25 miles up the Erie and to the Lock 1 of the Oswego. How to navigate the locks came back pretty fast and so with the perfect weather and short run—it was a great way to start traveling. Phoenix is a quaint little 1 block town that has a free dock, a farmers market, a mid-size bar and free pump out. We had fairly big afternoon thundershowers, which broke so we could go to the farmers market and the bar for a good hamburger. Then it rained all night-- wonderful sleeping weather. The teenagers of Phoenix have a tradition called the Bridge House Brats --they man the docks, help boaters and run the lock museum. But they are not out of school yet so we didn’t get to see them in action. We woke up after the storms to another beautiful, sunny day so about mid-day we took off up the 4 hour-ish run up the Oswego River/Canal. We did 6 locks (various ways to navigate—Sunny Days/Lola did best when you ran a rope behind a cable running down the lock and cleated it mid-ship---sometimes you had to just hold onto muddy ropes in the bow and stern). It is good to do 6 locks in one day at the first of the trip—lots of energy and enthusiasm. So it was a great day but Karen and I told the boys it was going to cost them a good dinner. We presently sit on the wall (free) at the city of Oswego and will walk across a bridge to get a good steak. Bridie Manor restaurant is right across the bridge and was recommended by Fran and Sue aboard Slacker Daze who are from Oswego.