You can find my previous “golden” posts here. From the first photo below until the seventh and last one, only twelve minutes pass. The setting is lock 17 in Little Falls, NY, where the lift/descent is 40.5 feet. .
Click here and here for some interesting historical pics.
Let’s start with 0703 hr on October 27 last.
Six minutes later . . . the chamber has drained and the sun has emerged from the clouds.
The door starts to raise as the counterweight descends . . . and against the south wall, it’s Urger . . . behind a wall of drips . . .
At 0715 . . . the captain has rung the forward bell and
now squints, looking into the sun for navigational aids on the way east to Amsterdam, about six hours away.
All photos by Will Van Dorp, who has postponed dealing with more unfinished business until tomorrow.
tugster: a waterblog 
7 comments
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November 8, 2014 at 11:20 pm
David Minor
I can remember sometime in the last four or five years eyeing a large barge in the closed lock. Looked like they had about six inches to spare at the inner side of both gates.
November 9, 2014 at 1:16 pm
Klyde
In that time frame, DONJON Marine has regularly taken delivery of their new 43.5 ft. wide deck barges by way of the Canal. The published lock width is 45 feet.
November 9, 2014 at 2:12 pm
David Minor
Klyde
As a board member of the Canal Society of New York State, living in Rochester, during the time frame I was referring to I may only have seen the lock once or twice. I was refering the length of the lock, not the width. But thanks, for the additional information on the DonJon and the width.
David
November 9, 2014 at 1:41 pm
tugster
klyde–did you see the first photo in this post? https://tugster.wordpress.com/2014/08/17/canal-craft-2-2/ cheyenne pushing two new scows eastbound at sylvan beach this summer . . .
November 9, 2014 at 2:45 pm
Klyde
I did, Thank you!
I wondered, at the time, if, those were scratches in the new paint on the forward corner in that photo.
Both Cheyenne and Rebecca Ann/Herbert P Brake have been used for the power on new barge deliveries from Erie on the NYS Canal .
November 9, 2014 at 2:50 pm
tugster
I wish I knew . . . I was very fortunate to have met “fire girl,” a stranger who mentioned she had seen this tow and wondered what it was AND had taken a pic with her phone
April 13, 2016 at 10:37 am
David Minor
I was subscribed at one time but then stopped getting updates. Are you still (2016) sending out updates. I ask because I’m on the program committee of the NCanal Society of New York State and am seeking speakers of our next symposium which will be the first Saturday in March, 2017, in Rochester, NY)