Three Lakers & Three Lights
Daylight hours are getting very short, reiterating summer 2019 is no more, but I’ve still got photos left from gallivants of warmer and brighter days this year, like this one of a downbound Thunder Bay passing Rock Island Light, once legitimately tended by an erstwhile pirate William Johnston. Later as we continued towards Lake […]
Meeting the Fleet 2022 B
I’m just observing, not criticizing, but the vessel turnout in 2022 seems quite small. I understand that lots of other things are happening globally. Following USS Bataan, USCGC Sycamore (WLB-209) and HMS Protector (A-173) arrive. They are both about 20 years in service and have both done assignments in the Arctic. Sycamore made a run […]
Barge Canal Miscellany
My approach to reporting on the archives so far has been to sort the images there, as you noticed if you’ve been following along. This follows a different tack: a set of photos I wasn’t sure where to sort. First, a July 1920 photo showing excursion steamer Ossian Bedell and steamer/barge Saratoga in Buffalo […]
Canal Tug Project D
Tugster gallivants now and then. It turns out that Albert Gayer did the same thing, as evidenced by this very rich photo clearly taken from the Route 104 bridge crossing the Oswego River and Oswego Canal looking north toward Lake Ontario. Remember that the image enlarges when you double click on it. The only constants–other […]
From the Line Locker 36
Sometimes I’m conflicted about what to post, like today with too many competing stories, and we’ll start with news, and Cisne Branco, which translates as “white swan.” The photo below shows Cisne Branco, a Brazilian Navy training vessel, in the sixth boro in May 2012 for a sixth boro OpSail event. Earlier this week, the […]
‘Ster Crazy 2
Toyster suggestion comes from Charles A Crosby, who writes: “Toy fleet I built for my grandsons. Wood, no plans just all by eye. The laker [which looks a lot like Roger Blough] is around 10.5″ and large container ship is 12″. The ships are in a general scale . . . not perfect by […]
Late Season Lakers 1
Ice causes major disruptions, like the ones in Troy NY this morning. Most of my previous posts featuring lakers were ice-free. Even ones from a road trip I took specifically to see ice were ice-free. Alpena had just lost her icy jacket. Yet, I’m fascinated by navigation through the ice. These photos give a sense […]
Late Season Lakers 3
I’ll take a different tack here. From a design perspective, Kaye E. Barker illustrates what I understand as the unique lines of the classic laker, sometimes called a longboat. She was launched the same year I was born. Combing through the records of her various owners, it might be possible to calculate the tonnage of […]
Late Season Lakers 2
Because of a cold brisk wind, I shot some of these through glass, which is never a good idea. But looking at this set, taken between Belle Isle and Sarnia, illustrate the variety of lakers, all in a context of not a single recreational vessel, something you’d never see in summer. Select info from […]
Thanks to Former Crews of Grouper
Languishing along the Erie Canal, now in the dry dock adjacent to E-28A, is tugboat Grouper. As she continues in limbo, folks far from the Erie Canal remember her, recall family experiences long ago, not thinking of her as Grouper at all, but rather . . . Green Bay. Here she assists passenger steamer SS […]
tugster: a waterblog 