Mark and Vicki Hills Great Loop Adventure Blog: Champlain Canal

We traveled further up the Hudson River, and then it turns into the Champlain Canal. This is a beautiful part of the country. Many Loopers do not take this route due to the CnO Railroad bridge which is at 17 ft. As luck would have it the rains were nonstop north of Waterford the night before we departed (including tornado warnings, high winds etc). If you are traveling up the Champlain canal system, expecting a clearance under the 17 foot bridge, after the rains came flooding the pool of water that goes under the bridge. Take action. Due to the rains, the clearance is, somewhere near say 16 feet (which is what I need to clear). What do you do? You can call the dam and lock upstream and have the pool lowered. YUP, you read it correct. We needed the pool lowered so that we can clear that bridge.

Boating Buddy Seahorse
......and..... exhale!
Clearance was okay due
to lowering of the pool

When they do this they actually drop the pool by two feet. As we approached the dam and lock upstream from this bridge, we heard a lot of chatter on the radio. People were asking why so much water was let go, causing a lot of turbulence, and thus many boats were all over the place trying to gain control of their boat, in the rapids (including us).

Locking through the Champlain Canal

The Canal valley is very beautiful. It was so peaceful, quiet, many birds chirping, and the sky was calm, and the winds were minimal. Very nice trip.

Half way between Waterford and Whitehall we stayed at a free wall in Fort Edward. Very nice entry and exit, free water and electric. Nice.

The Skene Manor stands proud
over Whitehall NY.

As we neared Whitehall, we saw the majestic Skene Manor high on the bluffs. Beautiful. I made my mind up right away, that I was going to see it up close. Well, we did. As it was sunday, it was open for tours. We made the trek up the hill via car. We walked down, the steep roads back to the boat.

Named after a former owner:
Potter Chocolate Puff

Chocolate Cherry Cake

Having desert

The tour was free with a purchase, and desert was $4 per serving, well that is easy.... lets have desert! The tour was fantastic, and our docent was REALLY into the tour. I went up an optional narrow stairwell to the very top window. What a sight from up there. We walked down, the steep roads back to the boat. More of the history can be read here CLICK.

View over the valley

Italian Wall paper.
The scene was a female fox and hound hunt.

A local made a scale replica of the
Village of Whitehall.
It was very detailed.

This is the view from the window
at the top floor

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Great ending to a great day
with Lynn

We stayed at Whitehall Marina (with an attached restaurant) The new owner, Lynn, was a superb host, He made Vicki, myself, Dan n Angie (from Seahorse) shrimp appetizers, personalized dinner, with salad and many drinks. A bit later, Lynn joined us for dinner. The restaurant was closed, while waiting for a permit, so we had the entire place to ourselves, and we all had a superb time. Lynn is a former world class APBA boat racer (offshore), and was the former owner of Hacker-Craft Boats. What a great guy, many talents, great personality.