Friday, August 24-Saturday August 25: Spencerport to Macedon to Lyons

Friday we left Spencerport around 9:30 am and headed back into the Canal.  We had consulted our new friend Dick the Canawler about choices to spend the night and he strongly urged us to consider Pittsford, so that was our preliminary destination.  As we traveled closer to Rochester we encountered more roads, and that meant more bridges to pass under.  The lowest height of fixed bridges on this part of the Canal is 16 feet.  We are just over 15 feet with the bimini up, so we had some nail biting moments.

The top of our bimini just clears the bridge by inches.

We also performed a man overboard drill on a drowning bat.  We both spied something floundering in the water at the same time and Dan plucked it up with the net.  We laid him out on the back deck to dry out, hoping he wasn't injured.  It took a couple of hours, but our bat friend perked up enough to start hissing and snapping at us.  We scooped him into a hat and put him ashore when we arrived in Pittsford just after lunch.

Rescued bat.

We opted for a walking stop in Pittsford instead of an overnight stop because of the time.  We criss-crossed the Canal at the lock we'd just come through as well as at a couple of bridges and ended up at a brew-pub Dan had read about called Lock 32 Brewery.  We stopped for a beer (Dan) and cider (me) and left unimpressed by the lack of interest in service by the lone bartender.  We were the only two people in the bar for a good twenty minutes and he never greeted us or even made eye contact until I bluntly asked if he was serving.  He was more interested in his phone, but we noted that he did manage to welcome a group of bicyclists who came in just before we left.  Because of our dawdling at the brewery, we ended up missing the lock opening at Macedon and tied up to the seawall for the night.  Locks close at 5 pm - something they failed to mention in the Boater's Resource guide the lock master hands out.  Now we know.

Macedon is a very small town, whose main claims to fame are being one of the few places in New York where you can see all three versions of the Erie Canal side by side and a very large plastics manufacturing company.  The town itself is a ten minute walk from where we tied up, and there were no amenities.  Friday evening we took a walk around and literally stumbled on the remains of an earlier version of the Canal. Saturday morning we took a walk through a nearby Butterfly/Memory garden and came upon the site of where the three different Canals sit side by side.  (In Macedon they use the older canals as spillways.)  The original Canal was 4 feet deep and 40 feet wide.  The second Canal was 7 feet deep and 70 feet wide.  The latest one is much wider and much deeper.

Three canals side by side - the sign points to each one.

Saturday we set off from Macedon close to 10 am, this time with no destinations in mind.  The lock keepers always ask and we just tell them we don't know.  (They ask because they call ahead to the next lock or opening bridge to warn them we are coming.) The weather was very hot - nearly 90 degrees - but with a good breeze.  We've been told it's been hot since the beginning of June.  There was more activity on the Canal today - lots of people out fishing, though several of them said they hadn't caught anything and that fishing in general has been slow this summer.

We stopped for a quick walkaround in Newark, and made a quick trip to the grocery store to pick up some hamburgers for supper.  We've been making great use of our little grill!  Newark had some charming trompe l'oeil murals:

We opted to spend the night in Lyons, which is a very boater-friendly place with free tie-ups, electricity, and water, and great showers at the fire station.  Unfortunately, the town is also enjoying an extended vacant building festival.  It's such a fine line for these waterfront places - they work hard to attract boating and cycling tourists, but when you get beyond the actual dock there isn't much there.  We saw this in the South along the Intracoastal Waterway too.  We took another walk in hopes of seeing the remains of aqueducts that used to line the Canal but it was hard to tell without accompanying pictures what the remains actually are.  We've been told that tomorrow we'll see some better ones as we cross through the Montezuma Nature Preserve.