Friday morning after getting our rental car, we drove to Milford. When we arrived Grant and Gail were there to greet us. We went to dinner (Clay and I had lobster, yummy!). Richard Stanco met us in the morning and we went together to Mystic. It was a very nice show, but I think Clay had the best time. He's found a boat that he wants to build when we get back to Naples and not only were there several boats there but the designer was the guest of honor. Clay spent time with different builders getting ideas and got to spend some time with the designer. The Caledonia Yawl is in Clay's future plans. We walked, walked, talked and walked the entire day. We had purchased tickets to attend a seaside barbeque with the designer as the guest speaker. It was getting close to dinner time, so I suggested I take some of our things to the car so we didn't have to carry them. Good idea Lori - so off I trudged to the parking lot. I walked to where I thought we parked...., uh oh... no car. When we arrived the lot had just filled and the attendant told us to park next to the curb. My first thought was that it was towed. I asked the attendant (who just came on duty) and he didn't know, but called on his radio to security. They said no cars had been towed today. He suggested I look in the other parking lots, maybe I didn't remember where we had parked. As I was headed out, I thought to myself, this is definately where we parked. I called Clay on the cellphone and told him I lost the car. He and Richard came out and we went through the whole thing again with the parking attendant. Clay and Richard both felt that the car was left in the same spot I thought. After deliberations with the attendant and security, it was decided that the car must have been stolen! The police were called. The first thing he asked was did we check the other lots - this happens a half dozen times a year. He asked one of us to go with him to look for the car, Richard hopped in the back of the cruiser, thanking the officer for being so thorough, but he was sure that we knew where we parked. After not finding anything in the other lots, the cruiser came back to our lot and proceeded going up and down the aisles. He pointed to a car and asked Richard, doesn't that look like your car? Oh my, how embarassing!!! The car was two aisles from where we were standing! Talk about total humilation. I felt better knowing that Clay and Rich also joined me in the embarassment. The officer was very kind and didn't rub it in. So we went to the dinner with our faces a little red.

Sunday morning we went to breakfast with Grant & Gail. Before we left I through the linens in the wash. When we got back in the house I heard a hissing noise - it was a leaking pipe. Looking on the bright side, at least we found it while we were there. So the plumbers (Clay & Grant) got out the tools and had it fixed in jiffy. Then Clay was going under the house to turn the water on and the door to the basement broke. A trip to Home Depot for some screws and it's in working order again. Now this delayed our trip back to the boat. It's a six hour trip, it was 6:30 p.m. before we got on the road. Clay drove while I slept (two hour nap). About 10:30 we stopped for fuel. While Clay did that, I decided to clean out the kitty litter. I didn't notice until it was too late, that PT was in the back window. As I was bending over he jumped on my back and out of the car. As he hit the pavement a semi truck flew by and hit his air brakes... PT took off like a jack rabbit. I chased him along a fence going down the highway. The traffic noise was really bad and he was really scared. He disappeared in the darkness. We walked up and down but could not find any sign of him. We finally got a room for the night and came back at 5:30 a.m. shaking food and calling him. Unfortunately we could not find him. It was really had to leave without him. Poor Bailey doesn't know what to do, he keeps looking for him. We hope that someone will find him and take good care of him. He was a very special little guy.

Clay and I were on our own now for the Erie Canal. We bought a ten day pass, but hoped to get through the system in half that time. We went through 20 locks elevating us 420 feet and then went through 10 more locks lowering us 175 feet to the level of Lake Ontario (245 feet above sea level). We spent a day in Wateford before heading into the first flight of locks. We didn't leave until about 9 :30 a.m. (very late) but still managed to get through 13 locks and 60.5 miles under our belt. At one point I slipped out of my croc and it went overboard in the lock. Fortunately they float and I was able to retrieve it with my boat hook. Of course Clay had to grab the camera. We stopped for the night in Canajoharie on a free town dock beside a beautiful park. Unfortunately the skeeters came out at dusk, so we didn't get to do much exploring. We left at 7:00 a.m. to make the first opening of Lock 14. There wasn't much traffic on the Canal, so most of the locks were ready for us, so we didn't have much wait time. Sylvan Beach was the stop for the night. This is a beach town complete with amusement rides on the shores of Lseake Oneida. We were hoping for good weather to cross, because it can get nasty quick. We walked around the water front. Clay's keen sense for ice cream never fails to amaze me but boy it was expensive. I thought his jaw was going to drop to the floor when the clerk asked for $12 for two cones (he did get a double scoop with a homemade waffle cone).

Another early morning but we were very pleased with the flat seas and the wind at our back. We had 30 miles to go and it was a very smooth ride. We re-entered the canal system at Brewerton and then at Three Rivers Junction made a right onto the Oswego Canal. Oswego is just 24 miles long with seven locks. We locked through the last lock that took us into Oswego Harbor where we would be putting up the mast. We tied up to a town wall and read the sign that it was not free. That wasn't a problem but it was pretty beat up and smelled, there was a free dock right before the last lock with picnic area that looked really nice, so we called the lockmaster and asked if he would mind letting us go back through. He was very nice and said no problem. He then told us that it happens quite often. We no sooner got tied up when a good storm hit and we were safe and secure. The next morning we locked through again and went to the marina to have the mast stepped. We basically watched while a crew did the work. Clay just handed them clevis pins as they attached the stays. By noon we were headed out of the harbor onto Lake Ontario crossing to Sackets Harbor. The sails went up and we had a nice sail until the winds fizzled. We found the quaint little harbor at Sackets, into a slip at Navy Point Marina where the boat will stay while we rent a car and drive back to the cottage in Milford, attend the Wooden Boat Show in Mystic and then back to the boat.

p.s. I forgot to mention - we made it through in just 3 days. Clay was really anxious for the boat show!

Statue of Liberty Are we there yet? Clay, Jim & Jan

Jim & Jan Galloway joined us for the next leg of our trip. We left Sunday afternoon, heading down the sound to Stamford where we took another mooring for the night. Our goal was to catch the current running down the East river on Monday morning. Once we got through the East river, the current coming down the Hudson was against us, so we anchored again behind the Statue of Liberty for the night. We caught the current on the Hudson and rode it all the way to Bannerman's Island where we anchored for the night. We were trying to get Jim & Jan to Albany by Friday because they had a square dancing event to attend. Clay wanted to stop in Saugerties because you could walk to everything right off the docks (as he remembered it). Well we past Kingston on the way to Saugerties, and as we pulled in Clay said it didn't look familiar, because it wasn't. It was Kingston that we had stopped at last time. Oh well, it was also a quaint little town that was a long walk uphill all the way. We did enjoy it. On Thursday morning we got up and off to Castleton On Hudson. This is the place to take the mast down in preparation for the Erie Canal. With the help of Jan and Jim, we used the boat club's hoist and got the mast down and secured in short order.

Sleepy Hollow Lighthouse Hudson-Athens Lighthouse Saugerties Lighthouse

During our trip we discovered black yuk coming from the engine compartment. Clay had just changed a belt on the alternator and it was a little loose, so he thought maybe that was the culprit, so he tightened, but it didn't stop the mess. Clay would clean it up as best he could and a couple hours later it was just as bad. Finally when we stopped in Saugerties, Jim found a hole in the bottom of the exhaust pipe. Clay hurriedly got on the phone and ordered the part to be delivered to the boat club on Friday. After we got the mast down, we were waiting for the part to arrive - Jan & Jim ran us to a hardware store and lunch at a neat dinner in town (sorry I can't remember the name). When we got back to the boat yard and located the part that had been delivered to a Carlton Serlgen at the same address but different location (really weird), Clay and Jim had it put back together amazingly fast. With lots of Go-Jo the guys cleaned up, it was time to say our goodbyes to Jan & Jim - off to their square dance.

Pete Seeger's Clearwater, Esopus Lighthouse

Clay and I stayed another night at Castleton, got the boat scrubbed down and most of the black yuk off. In the morning we headed up the river, stopped at a dock behind a grocery store for supplies and then to Waterford. When we arrived, we were pleasantly surprised to find Jim & Jan ready to take our lines at the dock. They drove up from Albany to spend the morning with us before their next session. We walked up to the first lock and checked it out before they had to leave. Clay and I walked a few blocks into town and did a load of laundry and had dinner. One of the volunteers at the Welcome Center told Clay about this great dinner and that they had the best breakfast, so Clay had me up before 6:00 a.m. so we could have breakfast and be back for the 7:00 lock opening. They did have really great pancakes.

When we got back on the boat we headed for Solomon's Island. We spent a few days just relaxing after the excitement of the wedding and the road trip. Other than taking a walk to the grocery store and West Marine, we didn't even get off the boat.

After resting up our next stop was Annapolis at Performance Cruising where the boat was made. A rubber boot called a "gator" that holds the oil for the outdrive had a leak, so we had ordered a new one. We anchored in Back Creek and had a lovely stay. We strolled around old downtown and took the dingy looking at the multitude of boats.

Next we headed North to Baltimore. Richard Stanco, a long time sailing buddy of Clay's took the train down from CT to meet us. We decided to wait an extra day because the weather wasn't the greatest, so we enjoyed some shopping and dining. We were eating dinner at Recreation Pier (where the boat was docked) when Richard said he though this was the spot where the shot a scene from Sleepless in Seattle. It was the scene where Meg Ryan and Rosie O'Donnell were sitting on a bench on the water. We asked the waitress, who asked her boss, and sure enough he was right! The pub that we had lunch at had over 800 different beers with like 120 on tap.

We got an early start and left Baltimore with a fair tide, carried it North up the Chesapeake, East through the C&D canal and had the current against us down the Delaware to the Cohansey River where we stopped at a marina and were reacquainted with someone we met there four years ago. Early the next morning we took the Cape May Canal to Cape May. We fueled up and continued on our way in light air to Atlantic City. Once again, Clay kept Richard and I far, far away from the casino's. We anchored in a little lagoon on the first try, last time it took four attempts because the entrance was so narrow we kept backing out for fear we wouldn't make it.

We had beautiful day going from Atlantic City to NYC where we anchored behind the Statue of Liberty. We waited in the morning to catch the current going up the East River, but didn't wait long enough, we had strong current the entire way. Once we got out onto Long Island Sound the current had changed and was now flowing into Long Island Sound against a 15 knot breeze, creating a very short nasty chop. We anchored behind a peninsula until the tide changed and the wind died down and then motored to Stamford. We took an empty mooring and spent a quiet night, planned to leave in the morning. In the morning we waited for the fog to lift and headed out of the harbor only to find the same conditions as the day before. We turned around and came back in and picked up another empty mooring. We expected someone to come collect, but they never did. The next day we motored to Milford in flat seas. We enjoyed our time with Richard, but he had to return home.

We spent the next few weeks in Milford. One of the first projects was to change the "gator" on the outdrive. In order to do this, the outdrive had to be removed, which meant we either had to have the boat hauled or find a nice sand bar with a good drop off and wait for the tide to go out. The first would cost $$$, the second option free, what do you think Clay opted for?? With the help of Richard and Keith Satterlee the job was done in a matter of hours. Thanks Guys!!

Keith was extremely kind and generous and lent us one of his cars while we were in town. We stayed on the boat until June 1st when our winter tenant left the cottage and then we moved in. The boys (cats) were very happy to be on dry land. The time went fast, got to see a lot of friends, but we were anxious to get back on the boat to continue our journey.