Illuminating

Greetings, Gentle Reader,

Betcha' you thought this monologue had ended, huh? Alas, it has not…at least not quite yet, because I haven't even gotten you off Cayuga Lake. Let's go, OK?

But first…fast forward. Last Thursday I was at 30 some-odd thousand feet, homeward bound from a teaching seminar in Colorado Springs. I had brought my lil' GPS device with me - the same one that silently counted out the miles and my glacial speed during the row - and as I held it to the window so that it could pick up satellite contacts, here's what it told me: the 4 miles that took me a full hour to row passed the window in 37.6 seconds. My entire 14-day trip was covered in 39 minutes, twenty twos seconds…hardly enough time to peruse the editorial page of the New York Times. I sipped my in-flight coffee, marveled, and turned the page.

The only other quasi-nautical connection to my Colorado Springs visit involved my unwitting participation in a morning aqua-aerobics class. I was swimming against the current in a nifty 50' diameter "current pool" to get some early-morning exercise when a svelte "aqua-aerobics" instructor informed me that a class would start in five minutes and she'd need the pool...unless I wanted to join in. I foolishly elected the latter, and within five minutes I felt - and no doubt looked - like a thrashing Labrador in the midst of a pod of sleek porpoises who anticipated each of their trainer's commands with precision and grace. It wasn't pretty…but I was a game pup, and it was a good workout.

OK, so it's Monday, June 30. We're pushing off from a three-day layover at Cayuga Lake; the gracious Morehouse crew, the wine country, the softening of the hands and derriere, all of this is now subordinate to getting back in the rhythm for the 200 mile pull to Troy. Today's destination: Baldwinsville, Lock 24, about 37 miles away. What started as a hot, calm day ends in a downpour and a nighttime arrival, and an interview over dinner with Richard Palmer of The Canal Times. Richard covers the entire waterfront of the Canal…all 360+ miles…and that he tracked me down in Baldwinsville on this given evening is a testament to his coverage. Richard is a great fellow, and I think whatever he works up will run in the August issue.

But before we dismiss this day, let me urge you to visit the links Kathy has set up to meet and learn about one Joe Deverell. I met Joe at the Morehouse boat show, and he invited me to stop by his house on Cross Lake which is bisected by the canal (the lake, not the house). I did stop and as the link will show you, Joe's passion, authentic Venetian gondolas, makes my rowing of an Adirondack guide boat seem wimpy by comparison. His elegant craft - a small ship, really - is 36 feet long and weighs three quarters of a ton. By comparison, my guide boat is 15 feet long and weighs about fifty pounds. Frankly, the only thing these vessels have in common is the necessity of human propulsion…one human to a boat, thank you. Joe is an imposing fellow and looks well able to get his 1500 pound vessel moving smartly, and he does: check out his site! He's been all over the Erie canal and has even given the Hudson a shot. HOW one propels a 36', 1500 pound craft over great distances - with only one oar, no less - is incomprehensible to me, but he does. Simply awesome. If you're at all nautical and are anywhere near red buoy #420 on the Erie, be on the lookout for Joe; he's a great guy, just the kind of adventurer and free spirit who makes a trip like this so enjoyable. I hope I will have the opportunity to return his hospitality when he ventures out again. An original Venetian gondola.

Sheeesh. I ask you, are we still the last remaining superpower, or what?

The next day dawns sunny and warm, perfect for an attempt to get across Oneida Lake, the single largest body of open water on the canal. For years I'd heard stories of Oneida Lake, warnings that were reiterated by any and all who knew I'd be attempting a crossing. You see, Oneida Lake is out in the open; there are no hills or mountains to blanket one from wind, and its shallow depth accentuates the wave action anytime a breeze kicks up. A Canadian trawler I'd met in Spencerport warned me that Oneida Lake presented the worst wave action he'd seen since leaving Florida two months earlier. These thoughts were on my mind 19 miles later, when I finally nosed into Oneida's wide waters.

A west-east crossing of Oneida presents an immediate challenge to the oarsman. There is no horizon: just water, as if one were looking into the Atlantic. I knew that I'd better follow the widely-spaced markers to minimize the distance across just in case the weather turned, and I lamented that I was starting across the 22-mile expanse so late in the day. It was 4 PM, and while it would be light even as late as 8, I knew I'd have to book it in the event the winds turned on the nose. All of the worst stories I'd heard about Oneida Lake's petulant weather were stifled by my get-home-itis, the bane of nautical and aeronautical adventurers throughout the ages. I lathered up, took a long drag of Gatorade, and leaned into the oars.

To make a long story short, the wind did come up smartly, but in the form of a blessed 15 knot tailwind, right from the stern. I was even able to augment my progress - for the first time- with the small 'pusher sail' I had mounted for just such an opportunity. The GPS was reading as high as 7 knots as I surfed most of the way across, intermittently rowing and using the oars to maintain stability. Broaching in the middle of Oneida Lake might have made for a more exciting tale, but I am not sure how such a tale might have ended. This particular day ended at Sylvan Beach at dusk, 44 miles closer to home and with an after-hours burger served by a most sympathetic waitress. It was "Cycle Night" at the Beach, but I had no trouble pitching the tent in the park and almost immediately finding the Land of Nod. My neighbors that evening were nursing a 48' sailboat back to Erie, PA, that had been hit - and fried - by lightning. My thoughts turned to Joe, standing tall in that gondola. Joe, stay low - or home - when the bolts start to fly, 'K?

Hey, I'm on a roll, and we're only four days from home. Let's tackle Wednesday, 7/2, OK? As I recall, it was pretty uneventful. But the night was illuminating.

"Illuminating, AL? What do you mean?"

As I arranged the boat for the day, I came across my sliding seat tucked up in the nose. I'd not been using it out of concerns for my posterior which had not been conditioned for the rigors of 10-hour days in the boat. I oiled it up (the seat, Gentle Reader, the seat) and fixed it to the rails that morning, thinking that I'd use it to make better time until the ache started to come and then abandon it for the fixed wicker seat I'd been using exclusively up to that point.

Gentle Reader, you do the math: by switching to the slider, my stroke rate went from 25 per minute to 16. a _____% decrease. The GPS showed a flat-water, no-current pace of 4.8 mph…fully .8 to .9 better than The Wicker Way, a _____% increase. I'd waited 226 miles to make this decision. Needless to say, I was "conditioned" to stay on the slider for the rest of the trip, lamenting that my early caution had cost me a lot of time and unnecessary calories. My legs were happy to finally have something to do other than cause me sunburned agony, and I was happy for their happiness.

My new Mach number of 4.8 - with an occasional "power ten" (thanks, Bean!) of up to 5.5 - enabled me to circle for a landing 34 miles later at Lock 19 in Frankfort. This town holds a special place in my heart as its bucolic grass strip was the destination of my first solo cross country flight when I was learning to fly in 1973. It took me a very long time to find the field, as I recall, because to this junior birdman it looked just like the agricultural fields that surround it. Only a Cessna sitting in what looked like a corn field alerted me to its location and, after a low drag over the field to be sure, I bounced in for the necessary logbook signature of "proof" to my anxious instructor that I'd been there…and a basket of tomatoes for more tangible evidence.

Ahh..Frankfort. Little did I know that my last Frankfortian Chapter had not yet been written.

I pulled the boat up on a low dock, emptied it of tent and supplies, enjoyed another placid evening setting up camp and enjoying Peg and Kathy's company (before they headed out to a picturesque B&B in Little Falls), and hit the hay at 9, looking forward to a good night's sleep.

I don't know what time it was. It doesn't really matter. When your tent has collapsed on you under the onslaught of a tornado-like vortex, your first inclination is not to check your watch. When your tent then literally lifts into the air, threatening to subject you to yet another take-off (and hard landing) in a town you'd thought you'd put in your aeronautical past, you tend not to ask, "What the hell time is it?" No, instead you ask, "What the hell is going on?"

The tent was alternately lifting and bucking, the rain flap acting as a perfect lifting airfoil in the hardest winds I'd felt in a very long while. Add lightning, thunder, and the resonating "splat" of fat raindrops, and you have the scene for "The Decision."

You see, even while I was trying to keep my tent and its contents - including me - on the ground (No, I had not staked it down, but given the placid evening upon retirement, you wouldn't have, either), I was thinking about my boat, pulled up on the dock fifty yards away. I'd not tied it down, and I knew that the winds could easily whisk it off the dock and create much trouble. I also knew that the moment I stepped out of the tent, it too would certainly be gone…to somewhere. Who knew?

"The Lady or the Tiger"…the Boat or the Tent?

Batman would have checked up on Robin. Roy would have checked up on Trigger. I, of course, had to check the boat. I stepped out of the tent and sprinted to the dock, the lightning and my own desperation illuminating the path. The boat was still there, rocking on the planks, and I lashed it to a tree. As I crested the bank back to the tent, the lighting illuminated the surreal image of my tent (and its contents) ballooning across an adjacent field like a crazed tumbleweed. In what should possibly be considered as a future crowd-pleasing Olympic event, I sprinted at least 50 yards to overtake it, tackled it at the knees, and literally rolled myself up in the fabric, trying to spoil its aerodynamic perfection. I subdued the beast, but the wind continued to howl. What to do now? To try to raise and stake the tent in such conditions would be even more entertaining (translate: comical) than the capture, and I had no appetite for playing "catch and release" again.

I've heard it said that "the decision not to make a decision is a decision." Rolled up in the fabric of my tent like an otter in sea kelp, I decided that the day's work was done. The boat would be there in the morning, and so would this mess. I slept, as wet…and as oblivious to my surroundings…as an otter.

Tomorrow…or sometime soon…we'll finish this trip, OK?

Hugs,

Mr. Frei