August 16, Baldwinsville to Cold Springs 4.3 miles

 

We got up early to work at our laptops this morning. I was behind in some work and, of course, in catching up with the log. Last night’s shopping trip to the Carousel Mall in Syracuse was more exhausting to me than the 15 miles we rowed. At 10:30 I decided it was time to get started so I went out to put the trailer back on the car. As I went out of the Microtel I found it raining pretty hard. I decided we should wait for a while longer to see if the storm went by. Heather came down and we decided we would go and get breakfast. It was still raining when we returned so we returned to our room and continued to work. I am proud to say I caught up with business correspondence. 

 

At 3:00 we left to go to the Lions Park . We did not bother to put up the canopy since it would be a short row and the wind was pretty strong. Starting out I noticed that the clumps of invasive water chestnuts had piled up on the ramp and many clumps were floating in the canal. We moved down wind at a pretty good clip. I was watching for the green markers to leave to starboard and failed to see a survey buoy with two red balls next to it in the middle of the channel. It was surrounded by an island of water chestnuts.

I felt a sudden soft impact as we penetrated half a boat length into the mass of weeds. It was not all water chestnuts but had long grassy reeds mixed in. My starboard oar was stuck in this mess and I had to push the bundle off the oar with the boat hook.  I was happy our other three blades had not become entangled. We might still be there!  Finally I was able to back us out of the mess and we continued on our way.

 

 

My starboard oar needed to be extracted!

 Free at last.

 

 Good ridence!

 

We had chosen a marina only about four miles away as our destination. The next ramp beyond this another 12 miles and we just did not have time to go there. Heather was feeling hungry and by the time we pulled into the ramp she was realizing that one blueberry muffin and coffee is not sufficient fuel to get through the day!  

 

This boy and his father arrived soon after we had pulled the boat out of the water. The boy was tryng to catch minnows with an aquarium net.

 

I called the number of a taxi service whose card I had picked up at the hotel. Half an hour later it arrived and I left Heather to rest on boat cushions. I was back in half an hour and $27 poorer. The meter on the cab started at $3! New York cabs seemed a bargain.

 

It had been a very short row but the distance left to get to Lake Oneida is manageable for tomorrow.