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Another quick one . . . starting with Toronto in the rear view.
Gaia Desgagnes passes as we wait outside the entrance the the Welland.
Once Spartan departs lock 1,
we head in.
Burch Nash waits outside Heddle Shipyard on the Canal.
Tim S Dool takes the inside wall to line up on lock 3.
At Port Colborne, CSL Tadoussac heads toward lock 8.
All photos, any errors, WVD, who has more photos but no more time.
Daybreak finds us entering the Welland Canal, taking a pilot from J. W. Cooper.
The past few weeks at MRC have brought the decapitation of Algorail.
Tecumseh is docked just below lock 8.
Algosea slips into the parallel lock chamber at lock 4, upbound.
We encounter NACC Argonaut as she heads upbound below lock 2.
Then we switch pilots at Lake Ontario level and
we pass Ojibway as we make a course for Toronto.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
Today’s post takes us from Port Colborne to Cleveland.
I’ll do another post about the MRC yard later. You can click here to see what these two looked like last year.
Algorail is nearly gone and work has already begun on Algoway.
At the Buffalo breakwater, Kathy Lynn was standing by with barge to receive concrete rubble, I think.
NACC Argonaut departs the Buffalo River for Bath, ON.
Manitoulin heads west.
Paul L. Luedtke tows scow #70. Is that Ashtabula in the background?
GL Cleveland assists barge Delaware out of the Cuyahoga…
until Calusa Coast clears the RR bridge and Cleveland returns to the barn.
All photos Will Van Dorp
The rosy fingers of dawn paint the eastern sky, as we
prepare to meet the pilot boat off Port Weller, which means Lake Ontario is nearly behind us. The pilot has just departed Federal Yukina via Mrs C, and
and readies to join us.
Summertime is the repair season for icebreakers like CCGS Pierre Radisson, named for the renegade French fur trapper.
Behold the immense entrance to the double flight at Welland lock 4.
A crewman on Tim S. Dool employs and time-tested communication device, and it actually works well.
Saginaw discharges coal.
CSL Welland meets us.
Just before climbing W-8, we pass Federal Seto, Happy Rover, and wait for
Atlantic Huron is tied up just north of the scrapyard . . . but that’s for tomorrow’s post.
All photos in the Welland Canal by Will Van Dorp, who posts about four days behind these days since wifi is not always available. When this post appears today, we are approaching the south end of Lake Huron.
Here are previous installments in the series. Summer sail can take the form of foil-raised GP racing as will happen in the sixth boro this weekend; it can also happen on longer courses and require stamina and endurance as happens in some races ending in Mackinac.
All the photos in this post come from Jeff Gritsavage, as he was delivering a yacht from Florida to Lake Michigan. Some of you will recognize that this shot was taken in an Erie Canal lock. A few of you will name the lock. Answer at the end of this post.
I’ll help you out here; this was taken on the Oswego Canal, a spur that was developed to connect the Erie Canal and Syracuse to Lake Ontario. Name the town?
Another town on the Oswego Canal. Name it?
This is the same town, and the boats are exiting the same lock as seen above. In fact, about 500′ beyond the opening mitre gates is the location I took this photo of Urger and a State Police cruiser almost exactly 5 years ago.
This is Oswego. White Hawk has arrived on its first Great Lake. The masts await and will be stepped because air draft issues
no longer apply.
Welland Canal is less than 30 miles long, but it’s
the way around Niagara Falls in 8 easy steps.
Coexistence with larger vessels is the rule on the Welland Canal.
Above and below is one of the hardest working tug/barge units on the lakes . . . Wilf Seymour and Alouette Spirit.
And on any lucky passage through the Welland, you’ll see vessels like Fednav‘s Federal Dee,
Polsteam‘s Mamry, and
Canada Steamship Lines‘ CSL Tadoussac.
Before I give the answers to the questions above, here’s another town/Erie Canal location to identify. Click on the photo to find its attribution AND the article that explains what’s happening with White Hawk.
So . . . the answers are lock E-23, Phoenix NY, Fulton NY, and finally above . . . .
that’s Rome. Click here for a previous tugster post on the Rome to Oswego run.
Many thanks to Capt. Jeff for sharing these photos here.
And I’ll be looking for White Hawk on the Lakes this summer.
Let’s try a variation: I’ve random tugs and random ships, in which I’ve confined most pics to a single general location and a a single photographer . . . me. “Really random tugs” combines locations, eras, and photographers. So why not do the same with ships, although in this case I’ve taken almost all the photos but in a variety of locations and times.
But this first one launches the concept. What can you surmise or identify about the photo below, not taken by me? Answer at the end of this post.
Spring brings the Great Lakes back to life. Here is a March 11 AIS capture of traffic on the Lakes. The “arrows” are US and Canadian CG doing ice ops. The rivers system around Chicago has some traffic.
The NOAA satellite image below provides the explanation . . . what looks ice covered IS. With the Soo scheduled to open on Monday, March 25, icebreaking carries high priority. Note Green Bay as well.
March 22 marked the opening of the Welland Canal. The first upbound ship this year was Thunder Bay; this photo I took in Quebec in October 2017. The first down bounder through the Welland was Algoma Spirit, but I’ve never gotten a photo of her.
Kaye E. Barker was the first springtime vessel out of Duluth; I took this photo in the last week of navigation before the Soo closed on January 15. The Soo is scheduled to open on Monday, March 25.
The KVK is a busy place all year round, although it’s not uniformly busy. On this day last month, Alpine Maya followed Port Richmond, which followed Atlantic Sun.
Stolt Integrity here stemmed while waiting to replace the tanker in the distance to leave the berth.
Tankers come in a variety of sizes; Selasse is a particular small one.
By now, have you figured out that first photo? I’ll give you a clue: vessel name is Nggapulu and as of last night she was in BauBau.
Traffic moves at all hours; night photos turn out quite unsatisfying, but golden hour ones I enjoy. Can you guess the hull color on this one?
Foreshortening belies the amount of distance actually between the stern of the Evergreen ship and Diane B/John Blanche.
The colorful Stena tankers, bears and all, seem to appear mostly in winter.
So here you have the answer, sort of. Indonesia, being a far-flung archipelago supports a ferry system called Pelni, an acronym. As an example of distances here, find Jakarta lower left. From there to Makassar roughly in the center is 1000 miles! Pelni operates about two dozen ferries of various designs. Ngga Pulu has classic lines and was launched in 2002.
Here’s an English language site about traveling the archipelago. Restless? Aye peri!
Many thanks to Hannah Miller for sharing the photo of Ngga Pulu. I’m not sure how that’s pronounced, but it’s named for a mountain. Learning about Pelni and seeing this map gives me a whole new appreciation of Dewaruci.
What I noticed first about Johanna G is
the cranes.
Never have I seen cranes that stripped of recent paint. Maybe rust-busting is happening as we speak, but
new coating of paint –IMHO– should be applied soon. See a photo of her possibly new and with blue/gray cranes here.
As of this posting,
she’s already headed into the Atlantic . . . Gibraltar bound I believe.
The zoom lens foreshortens the distances here; there was adequate time between Johanna G clearing the bridge and the lowering of the span. There’s no room for a repeat of the Windoc incident.
This photo clearly shows what “seawaymax” means.
All photos by Will Van Dorp, who noticed that the other photographer working in proximity to me was stopped shooting for a while to wave the Portuguese flag, not the Madeiran.
This is a reminder also of the NYS Canal Conference happening on Staten Island next week. I will show Graves of Arthur Kill and speak on a panel about the hidden places of the sixth boro.
I’d first assume this was a small tanker, but I was wrong.
Here’s the answer to cargo: dry bulk cement. In previous lifetimes, it had carried grain as well.
A hint of ghostwriting midships and to the right of “SPIRIT” shows another name or several names—Gagliarda and Ardita—were there earlier.
Arriving soon after Mckeil Spirit, was this vessel that I’d seen in Buffalo earlier this summer, wedged in alongside the Lafarge dock.
All this up-high piping suggests cement carrier as well, reminding me of English River, less than a mile away waiting for the scrappers’ torches.
Covered over with paint is the Arklow fleet logo. I never have been able to learn if there’s a technical term for a vessel logo situated on the bow, almost like a harkening back to a figurehead, not unlike the one of the barque Peking.
Now I understand: this is not saying a “new [division] of Algoma; it’s a joint venture between Algoma and Nova, the latter a company from Luxembourg.
Here’s the rest of the fleet. For a photo/article of NACC Argonaut in Oswego, click here.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
At this point in my life, I have a solid list of projects yet to undertake. One of those is scratch-building a ship or boat model. Nothing screams “build me” more than this classic laker style. Enjoy a lot of photos here, curvaceous details to render in a model.
Like the dead ship Paul H. Townsend to the far left, Michipicoten was built in salt water, i.e., Sparrows Point, MD.
If you’re wondering how to pronounce Michipicoten, it’s five syllables with emphasis on PI.
That spar mounted on the bow of “house-forward” lakers is called a steering pole, a guide for the helmsman.
Note the crewman watching the camera from the port light above the “M”?
Half the Lower Lakes Towing fleet has the traditional “house-forward” design: Cuyahoga, Mississagi, Saginaw, Ojibway, and Manitoba.
Note the many large windows on the lee side of the forward superstructure.
The base machinery of the self-unloaders intrigues me.
Note the rounded stern and exposed top of the rudder.
The curves on these boats never quit.
Into Welland lock 8 she goes.
Yup . . . this winter I need to play around with scratch-building a model, and I’ll see if I can make it eight feet long.
All photos and sentiments by Will Van Dorp, who wants to remind you of the NYS Canal Conference happening on Staten Island next week. I will show Graves of Arthur Kill and speak on a panel about the hidden places of the sixth boro.
Port Colborne is the location of MRC, the clean-up business, and right now they’ve a few years–my guess–of projects.
JW Cooper goes in and out several times a day.
But what I wanted to watch was the traffic, up and down bound, like Algoma Buffalo. The previous two times —here and here–I’d seen this vessel predated her sale to Algoma.
Port Colborne is very quiet on a rainy early fall Sunday,
so quiet I could hear the engine room crew commenting about the town’s stillness,
although I’m guessing they spoke louder than otherwise because they had on ear protection.
Algoma Buffalo headed to a turn-off on the Welland and self-unloaded some of her cargo. The 24,300-ton-capacity vessel started her cargo-carrying life late in 1978, i.e., just over 40 years ago.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
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