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The sunrises and sets have been extraordinary, so here’s my contribution to the collection on the web.
Pilot transfers, like this one off Port Weller, always catches attention.
Sea Eagle II waits at the north end of the Welland Canal.
CCGC Des Groseilliers is getting some TLC at Heddle.
And then we headed southbound in darkness. In the morning at Port Colborne, Algoma Discovery headed into Erie.
A bit later, Lincoln R came in from Erie with a hold full of fish heading to Minor Fisheries.
CSL Tadoussac headed unbound also. She has the bow but unfortunately not the stern of Frontenac.
And as we entered the Cuyahoga, I finally got my first glimpse of Laura L. VanEnkvort.
I’d hoped to get a shot of her starboard side, but could not. She’s originally a Candies vessel.
All photos, any errors, WVD.
Yes, I missed doing this in July, so today I play catch-up.
Three vessels were on the July page. First, it’s Louis C, a small tanker reborn as a small crane ship. I was last aboard her on a very cold morning in January 2020. The enclosed workshop forward of the wheelhouse features a wood burning stove that has no appeal in August but was very welcome in January.
Fugro Enterprise, now as then, is working off Atlantic City, making bathymetric charts of the area where the 99 turbines of Ocean Wind will soon sprout above the surface of the waves.
The third and more prominent boat on the July calendar page is Nathan G, and rather than use a photo from July 2019, let me put up this one from July 2020, where Nathan G is one of the tugs escorting USS Slater to the dry dock. That dry docking will soon be finished, and Nathan G will possibly accompany the destroyer escort back to Albany. For more info on Slater and memberships, click here.
For August, on 17 August 2019 at 0615 and we were at the western end of Lake Ontario approaching Port Weller. You’re looking over the after deck of Grande Caribe. In case you’ve not heard, Blount Small Ships Adventures made a shocking announcement this Monday that their BSSA vessels are for sale.
Welland Canal pilot vessel Mrs C approached ready to deliver a pilot, having just
retrieved one from the down bound Federal Yukina.
A few days later in August at 0722 and at the northern end of Crystal Island in the Detroit River, about 50 miles north of Toledo OH and 25 south of Detroit MI, we passed
Edgar B. Speer as she was about to enter the down bound lane between Crystal Island and Stony Island.
Speer is one of the 1000-footer, aka “footers” who ply the Upper Lakes unable to get beyond Lake Erie because they greatly exceed the dimensions of the Welland Canal. Speer‘s cargo capacity is 73,700 tons. That would be a lot of trucks.
All photos, WVD.
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.
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.
BFD’s fireboat Cotter is always a high point of a Buffalo visit, a Crescent Shipyard 1900 (!!) Elizabethport NJ product, aka the world’s oldest active fireboat.
Headed west for Port Colborne, we’re treated to beauty over SteelWinds.
As darkness looms, JW Cooper arrives to drop off a pilot.
Imagine my dismay passing MRC after dark,
and head down to Ontario level through the night.
Daybreak brings us to nearly Ontario, and we wait for Wilson T. Cooper to exit the lock W-1.
Port Weller’s shipyard a year ago was occupied by Presque Isle.
We drop off our pilot and
enter Lake Ontario.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
This is Oswego to Port Colborne, by way of Rochester . . . actually Charlotte on the Genesee. The whale-watch headed Grande Caribe. No . . . the Great Lakes have no whales. At the port is Robert S. Pierson, a river-class bulker.
I repeat a variation of this image. The Erie canal flows under the arched bridge and the Genesee . . . under the longer, flatter bridge.
We take a pilot right outside Port Weller, the Ontario end of the Welland Canal, and then
enter upbound.
Nassau-flagged Victory II met us between locks 7 and 8.
From right to left here, that’s Pierson again, a sailing vessel, and Capt. Henry Jackman.
Now more on that sailing vessel . . . schooner Empire Sandy. You have to read this link: she started her life as a tugboat!
HMCS Oriole is a 1921 ketch, whose origins hearken back to both Toronto and Neponset, MA.
Capt. Henry Jackman waits in Port Colborne as does
Baie St Paul. Jackman was built in the Collingwood Shipyards, whereas St Paul comes from Jiangsu China.
All photos by Will Van Dorp.
Port Weller is the north terminus of the Welland Canal, and as such, sees either a pilot boarding or debarking, which was the case here. Mrs C has an equally attractive fleet mate at Port Colbourne, the southern terminus. The vessel in the background left will appear in an upcoming post.
Some 80 miles to the east Kimberly Anne (1965) was docked in Rochester’s Charlotte port.
Walking along the beach there, I saw this historical sign of tug Oneida and schooner H. M. Ballou, at different times both owned by a George W. Ruggles.
Fifty or so miles to the NE we enter the Oswego River to find the busiest (IMHO) unit on the lakes: in the past few years I’ve seen Wilf Seymour and Alouette Spirit at least 6 times between Lake Huron and Quebec City. Here’s more info on Alouette’s aluminum operations, at one time and possibly now the largest aluminum producer in the Americas.
Click here for more info on Novelis, the client here in Oswego.
Anyone tell me the weight of one of these ingots?
Moving from contemporary to retrospective, the Phoenix dock was hosting schooner Lois McClure and tug Churchill as we passed.
For more close-ups, check out tug44’s take.
Click here for a complete history of the replica schooner Lois McClure.
All photos by Will Van Dorp, who hopes you all enjoy the last day of summer 2017 today.
tugster: a waterblog 
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