Into the US

Up to this point, we had been blessed with beautiful weather. On the 27th, however, we woke to heavy rain. As we made our run to Cape Vincent, the weather broke and the skies started to clear.

Clearing in was relatively uneventful. I had been forwarned that we would need a US Customs decal and I had it. When you buy it over the internet, you have a choice of delivery methods: first class mail or UPS. They warn you that mail can take up to 6 weeks but that UPS would take only 4 business days. Figuring that we would need both the 07 and 08 decals, I ordered the 07 one with UPS delivery (as we had only about a week before our departure) and let the 08 one be delivered by mail. They both arrived on the same day: 3 business days after I ordered them.

We were originally going to spend the day in Cape Vincent, provisioning at our leisure, but the day promised to be calm and the forecast for the next few promised strong winds, so we elected to head across Lake Ontario to Oswego where we would enter the Oswego Canal. Leaving Cape Vincent at about 1:00 PM, we arrived at Oswego none to early, at 7:00 PM, and just as things were getting dark.

We did our shopping in the moring of the 28th and then, in the afternoon, set out to traverse a few locks, into the land of the Oswego Canal and free docks. Unfortunately, just in front of a dam with water flowing over the top, our steering failed. Out went the anchor double quick. Luckily, the wind was blowing us away from the dam. After an unsuccessful attempt to repair the steering with hardware on board, we used to motor to steer us into the dock at the next lock station. Our fold up bicycles proved to be very handy, enabling me to return to a hardware store I had visited earlier in the day. Some turning blocks in the steering system were held in place by #10 SS wood screws. One of these had sheared and then another pulled out of the wook. I replaced the screws with 1/4 inch through bolts. That should hold much better.

I guess all is well that ends well, but that certainly gave us both a scare. Better that it failed in a canal than on Lake Ontario or on the Atlantic Ocean. Fortunately, there are no other pieces of the steering system that are fastened to wood. Not too far in the future, I think I will replace the wood with something that cannot rot and will not weaken with age as, even with the through bolts, I will always be suspicious of this part of our steering system.