We had a lot on our agenda this day; first thing was retrieving our mail from
the nearby Model City post office, which we did easily enough. Then, on to
the famous Erie Canal, part of which was located not far from us, in Lockport.
Lockport preserves 2 of the Erie Bargeway locks -- the Bargeway replaced the
canal in the early 1900s. Almost none of the original canal exists any
longer -- several widening projects have obliterated most of the original.
However, at the time of its completion, it was an unparalleled engineering feat:
over 300 miles of hand-dug ditches through wilderness; tree stumps by the
thousands pulled out using teams of horses and mules. All done in only 8
years.
We were
fortunate in that when we got there, several boats were using the locks, so we
got to watch the locks operate.
Here, Jordan is inspecting one of the huge locks, watching as the water level
rises -- about 1 vertical foot every 5 to10 seconds. They can completely
fill or empty one of these locks in 4 minutes -- somewhere between 25 and 50
vertical feet of water.
Most of the lock traffic these days is tour boats carrying loads of tourists
through a few locks. However, while we were there, several small pleasure
boats were negotiating the locks as well. It costs between $21 and $100 to
navigate the canal between the Hudson River and Lake Erie, depending on the size
of the boat.
After watching a tour boat move up through the 2 locks, we went down to the
Museum to see what they had to offer.
This is a shot up a spillway adjacent to the locks, just to give you an idea
of how much height is involved.

Apparently the Museum operators had learned all they knew about proper
exhibit design and arrangement by carefully studying the efforts of the National
Parks Service. This was undeniably the worst museum we had seen to date,
and that is really saying something. Needless to say we took no
pictures. Since the tour boat was due to return back through the locks
soon, we headed back up to observe.
And then we drove to the Canadian side of the falls. We all unanimously
agreed that the Canadian side offered the best viewing. Here we are at
Horseshoe Fall. Photo by Remy.

This was my first time to see Niagara. It was magnificent.


We took the "Under the Falls" tour, which involved navigating
through some tunnels. Here we are midway.

There is a very wet view platform at the bottom of the falls. We all
enjoyed the invigorating spray.

This odd photo was taken through my yellow poncho, since it was too wet to
have the camera out in all the mist.

And here we are exiting the viewing platform. Looks fun, huh?

The next day we revisited the Canadian side, and Jody and Jordan walked back
across the Rainbow Bridge to the US. Jordan posed midway.

That night, we visited the American side, and took this.

August 29 - Geneva on the Lake