Frances

Like Pelham, Frances has been around the block quite a long time, since 1957, in fact.  Type Frances Turecamo –or just Frances– into the search window on the blog and you’ll see more of her.

 

I’m happy to see the shine on her and even happier to see her in the water and at work.

Do the maintenance and repairs.  Keep the paint where it’s needed and

 

she’ll make money for a long time.

All photos by Will Van Dorp, who is still on the road.

Highway 4

Here are the previous posts by this name.

June 2014 . . . not quite 100 miles west of Albany.

March 2015 high, dry, and cold maintenance time on Staten Island.

Same time and place as the first photo above.  Actually leaving lock 19 and headed east.

Again . . . winter maintenance.

Outbound Oswego harbor, June 2014.

And more Staten Island, March 2015.

Hustling hither and yon along the waterways since 1958, if she could speak,

I’d love to hear the stories.

All photos by Will Van Dorp.

Waterford Tugboat Roundup 2013 b

First, and I quote, the roundup “began in 1999 as a way to preserve and promote the maritime industrial heritage of the State Canal System….”  Many thanks to the sponsors and the volunteers.   Thanks to the town for their “hawsepitality”  (That’s Jed’s newly minted term.) which brings about 25,000 people to a Saratoga County town of fewer than 10,000.

What light is this illuminating the Second Avenue Bridge between the town and Peebles Island?  And what is the kayaker . . .

and all these others looking at . . .

while bathed in varying light?

If you do Facebook, catch about a minute of the grand finale of  Fireworks by Alonzo‘s artistry in Waterford the other night here.

Waterford’s pyrotechnics are unusual because the geography makes you feel them.  There’s light, sound, and some serious concussion, and that’s all one thing, singular.  And the only thing I like more than watching the explosive colors is to see what they illuminate. . .  like Mame Faye and the glassy water–after an almost shower–at the confluence of the Erie Canal and the Hudson River.

Scroll through here for my video of the show four years ago.

I’m awed by the power and flash reflected in this fresh water.   Click here for my fotos from the first roundup I attended seven years ago.

And then it’s morning and time to clean up, check

the condition on the barge, move

the tow to a place where the ebris can be offloaded, and

send in the underwater inspection expert.

??

For that underwater inspection of prop and flanking rudders . . . that’s tomorrow’s post.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp, who needs to get to his paying job.

Here’s a fireworks post I did a little over a year ago.

Waterford Tugboat Roundup 2012 c

Three vessels at the roundup this year appeared there for the first time .  . well sort of.   The red one, aka Augie, was in fact there for the first time.  The other . . . on the left, Frances, has been there before but with very different appearance.

Here’s a closeup of Augie, who first made a show here and here.

The surprise newcomer at the roundup this year was Wendy B, but with a bit of search, I’ve found this blog about here journey from Toronto to DC seven years ago, by the previous owners.

Click here for the specs at the time of her last sale.  Talking with the owners, I learned she was delayed in the sixth boro–on her recent northward passage–by the 4th of July 2012  fireworks.  Does anyone recall seeing her in town?  Here are my fotos of the spectacular illuminations that day.

Here’s Augie, nestled up to Cornell, in current colors.

When I saw Frances this weekend, I first assumed I was looking at Margot, currently working on Lake Ontario.

Here’s how Frances looked two years ago.

I’m enthusiastic to see Frances (1957) covered in new paint that just exudes vitality.  Soon she’ll be working like Margot, her one-year-younger sister.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Unrelated but thanks to Barbara for sending this link along:  South Street Seaport in the news.

Waterford Tugboat Roundup 2012 a

Here are a, b, c, and d from two years ago.  As I write this, the Roundup has not yet finished.  What’s left is the fireworks extraordinaire, the grand finale.  But the Roundup begins with a parade up from Albany northward.  On the west side of the river is I-787, and by parading along the Interstate at homeward rush hour Friday night, like a circus parade promenading past the farms, mills and markets of yore, this curious group of vessels is designed to convince weekend-planning commuters to hang out at the Waterford waterfront parts of Saturday and Sunday.

The Rensselaer side of the river (or maybe this is North Greenbush) looks fairly wild in places . . .  with vestiges of industry,

but Troy is proud of its present and

and past.

Once through the Federal lock,

The flotilla makes its way to Waterford.  more on that the next few days.

Amen .  . . thanks to the sponsors!!  And I enjoyed meeting so many new people.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.

Solstice Post 3

This is the work and play post . . . the real connection is that although we all have to work, an important secret is to enjoy what you do.    Imagine this enthusiasm in a  co-worker or yourself on Monday morning, whether you’re struggling to finish a group report or

like the Villiersdorp farmers and ALE and their associates moving Alwyn Vintcent on 80 functioning wheels–at least– around Table Mountain.

If you don’t enjoy it . ..  or relish the challenge and execution,

you won’t even start the job.

This is the only way to get through obstacles that stop your progress . . .   Revel in the task  . . . like

the folks at NYS Marine Highway, now shipping corn–yes–corn–out of Ontario and into the Erie Canal.    How long has it been that agricultural commodities have been shipped on the Erie Canal . . . how long have people talked about shipping same on that waterway that revolutionized NYC . . .  or international shipping entering the Erie Canal, but Margot (over a half century young) and its crew

is actually-as we speak–

doing it!  Bravo to the folks at NYS Marine Highway.   Click here for lots more fotos of Margot.

Sun dancing is great, but the spirit that drives the dancers also animates folks

who dance with ships and lines and

get one task done safely and then move to the next and the next.

So whatever you do, whatever I do . . .

I know that if I can do it in a way that gets me satifaction and pleasure,

the better.

South African fotos come compliments of Colin Syndercombe;  the Oswego/Erie Canal fotos,   . . . Allan and Sally of  Sally W,   and all the others by Will Van Dorp.

Related:  Here’s another ALE job.

Unrelated:  The longest marathon swim starts tomorrow morning over 100 miles up the Hudson.

Colours

“Blue is the colour of the sky . . .”  in the Donovan song of almost a half century ago, but this isn’t a post about foliage, although I took this foto Friday . . . if you’re wondering why I didn’t post.  Guess the location?

Brown is the color of the Hudson, yesterday, as seen high above crane barge Columbia (and Sarah Ann??) viewed from Storm King, about 60 miles north of the sixth boro.

Brown flows under Margot and Benjamin Eliott at Waterford about a hundred miles north of Storm King.

It has been the color of the Hudson and feeders streams since the visitation of Irene (note the high point on the Second Street Bridge) and the rest of the rainy season in the Hudson and other Northeast watersheds.

But go another 70 or so miles north of Waterford, not far from the headwaters of the Hudson (as far north from the sixth boro as Washington DC is south!!) and the

waters through the rock

are clear, not cafe au “way too much” lait.

Twas a good place to get away and

reconnect.  Hiking here . . . offers no clue of what cliffs lie downstream.

I know I missed the arrival of tugs Justice and Reinauer Twins and who knows whatever else     . . . come through the boro, but gallivants can’t and shouldn’t be postponed.

Fotos by Will Van Dorp.   More Donovan?

And speaking of colors from inks and pigments as multi-hued as nature up north, check this out from my favorite niche-leaping, river-crossing, shipshifting cliff-dweller . . .  and so much more.

For explanations on all manner of color, checkin with seaandsky.

Bridge to Somewhere

OK, Seattle just has to wait when a bridge (that gets built over  100 miles north of the location where it’s destined to replace another bridge that has stood for 109 years)  gets shipped downriver by three tugboats AND gets covered by the NYTimes AND the Wall Street Journal.  My plan is to get fotos early tomorrow morning as it navigates between Manhattan and Hoboken or Jersey City.  For now, with many many thanks, here are fotos from Deborah dePeyster . . . as it passed by Coxsackie, where she camped out so as to ensure not missing the excitement, then

Catskill Point;

then fotos by Jeff Anzevino from the walkway and bridge at Poughkeepsie;

then Harold Tartell with fotos from Newburgh.

What the mainstream newspapers missed was the names of the tugs:  left to right:  Ruby M, Margot, and Elizabeth.

I have and will share lots more fotos from Seattle, a location seriously trying my faithfulness to the sixth boro.  But for now, my plan is to get up early enough to catch the bridge  edging somewhere tomorrow at dawn through the sixth boro.

Articles from the mainstream media are here:  NYTimes, Wall Street Journal.  New media here: DNAinfo.com, iStockAnalyst. My only criticism of these articles is that they do not specify  the names of the tugs, not to be picky or anything.

After “taking your house on a trip,” moving a bridge to somewhere is the next best thing.  Oh, what is the world coming to?

Thanks to Deborah, Jeff, and Harold for these fotos.  So if the old Willis Avenue Bridge lasted 109 years, how might you imagine the replacement for THIS one happening in 2119?

More Seattle soon.

Independence Day Weekend

To see a recap of the North River fireworks, click here, and for Queens/Bronx/East River fireworks foto’d by Mitch, click here.  In that foto, you can see three barges, each accompanied by a tug.  Anyone know which ones?   I mostly heard fireworks in what sounded like a north woods war, which must have chased all the fish into the deepest holes in the lakes.

On the way up, I sailed with Jeff Anzevino on Tide Rider and caught this view of NYS Marine Highway‘s  Margot‘s wake just after we had

circumnavigated this nameless

and peerless 1948 Chris Craft, which seemed to serve as waterside chase

crew for this hot air balloon, one of a half dozen launching from Poughkeepsie.

Later we headed to Portsmouth, where we talked to Bob Hassold (facing camera).  Interested in his 1966 tug (ex-Matinicus)?  It’s for sale.  See this article.  Bob runs a tugboat paraphernalia shop on the Portsmouth waterfront, where I found Thomas R. Flagg’s book New York Harbor Railroads in Color (a treasure for anyone interested in a “pre-truck intensive” when short-sea-shipping and cross-harbor shipping was the rule!) for less than Amazon’s price.    If you don’t know this book and are interested in the sixth boro, this IS a “must-read” book.  Tug Alley . . . it’s the most intense tug-oriented shop in the East . . . if not in the world–and I was not asked or paid to say that.

I love Portsmouth, up north in general . . . .  with its lights,

boats,

sights,

blue produce and brews,

planters painted in red-white-blue,

(actually these are Hudson River bottom feeders), and

the water.  Enjoy this gratuitous, top-feeder tugster-relaxing foto.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp, who continues gallivanting (from Puget Sound) soon.

And happy 234th . . .  read the sentiments here.