Ports on Oneida Lake 3

By 3:00 pm, the deck of Wards Island was at capacity with buoys.  It was time to head back west to a scow on the wall in Brewerton, an accidental destination for

Champlain almost exactly 400 years ago.  Champlain was a gallivanter extraordinaire, crossing the Atlantic about 25 times in those days, and  a guy even better at negotiation and diplomacy than he was at traveling.  But I digress.

 

Since there are two bridges between the Lake and the scow, the boom had been lowered and now it’s raised for the job.  Attached to the scow is the larger tender known not by a number but as Dana.

It’s clearly November when 4:30 looks like this.

 

 

Boom is lowered for the several miles back to Lock 23, where a surprise

 

awaits me.  I had assumed that only the stern propellor on Wards Island was operational, but after Syracuse uncoupled and we started the rotation to tie up,

there was prop wash from under the bow, just as you would expect from a double-ender ferry.

 

In order to spin the boat 180 degrees without having to make a 36-point turn, Syracuse put some pressure on the bow,

and by 5:40 we were all fast. Then it was time to

put the power of Wards Island to sleep.   Below deck there were a bunch more surprises, like these port lights as seen from within and the rivets.

And two spacious accommodations, one on each side of the vessel.

Two engines, although only the Cat D353 Series E runs.

A Frankenstein knife switch board.

And mentioned in this post last year, Wards Island began life as a ferry in 1929, looking like her twin . . . Tenkenas, there were more surprises like

 

this speaking tube and behind it,

this brass builders plate.

 

All color photos here are by Will Van Dorp.  I’m not sure of the source, the date,or the location of the b/w photo of Tenkenas above, although I know where and where else I might find more.

Many thanks to the NYS Canal Corp and its floating plant for permission to do this series.

Unrelated and sad news:  I learned yesterday that John Skelson has passed.  RIP, John. Click here for some of the many posts I credited to him in the past years.