Beavers & More

It has been a fun week for me up in Ticonderoga with kayaking four days in a row. Dave has had some things he has had to do back at home and has been back and forth. He is now north for the rest of the week, so before the wind really picked up this morning, we decided to go paddling at Putnam Pond on the top of Chilson Hill (using our usual plastic kayaks). We have done this many times, but it is amazing that we can still make new discoveries, which we did today. There have always been lots of beaver lodges on this large pond, but today we kept hearing rushing water at the south end. That's where we found this huge dam that these tenacious animals had built. It was way up in the marshland, but I found a water trail to access it. With all the latest rain, the water level was quite high and part of the dam had breached, causing a waterfall. I am sure the beavers will soon be hard at work repairing it.

We also found a couple other smaller waterfalls that were created with the excess rainwater coming off the mountains. Like I said to Dave, this body of water with the mountains surrounding it, felt like we were in the crater of a volcano. Of course a trip to Putnam Pond wouldn't be complete without seeing and hearing loons.

With the south wind increasing (we were glad we weren't in the Oru yaks), we stayed in the lee as much as possible, which included finding shortcuts through the shallow marshes. This cut was through the pickerel, which is an invasive plant, but quite pretty with all the purple flowers. 

What another great adventure and it is so close to 'home'! Even closer to our house is the Ticonderoga town beach on Lake George, which I kayaked from yesterday. I thought I was the only one there at 9 AM until I saw these 8 sunbathers. They are pretty birds, but oh so messy. I felt sorry for the lifeguards who had to pick up after them before the real sunbathers and swimmers arrived. Oh well, such is life at the lake.

Portable Adventure

Since we have not been able to go north as much this summer, but there have been days or partial days of nice weather that we have missed out on, we decided to get portable kayaks to explore some of the smaller lakes in our area. We had researched the possibility of lighter kayaks, even back during last winter, but never followed through with buying them. This summer has been the perfect time to get our butts in gear and get back out on the water. We purchased Oru Origami Lake model folding kayaks, and although we were quite skeptical about the whole idea, they actually do work! These are made for calm water, which is fine with us. Today we tried them out for the first time, up at Lake Desolation. We must have been quite a sight as Dave was attempting to assemble them with me reading the directions to him. They are a bit wider and flatter than we are used to, so we discovered that they 'wag' through the water, especially when going upwind. They also don't have any footpads, but leave it to Dave, he will come up with something innovative. For what we are going to use these kayaks for, they will work well, and only weigh 18lbs a piece! Black isn't the best color to be noticed by boaters out on the water, but we have orange paddles and bright life jackets, and we plan on not being on open water with power boaters anyway. 

It's time for new paddling adventures! Plus, did you notice my new slimmer husband? He has lost over 25 lbs.! Go Dave!

Horsepower Alley

We finally made it up to the 1000 Islands on Friday, and what perfect timing it was. Not only did we see wooden boats, but we were there for the Make-A-Wish Charity Poker Run in Clayton. Saturday was the actual event, but the boats were out on the St. Lawrence River and at the docks, which were open to the public to wander and see all the colorful variety and extreme power. This included one boat with 5- 500 h.p. outboards, which is just slightly more powerful than the 4- 600 h.p. engines that abounded...but 5 outboards sure looked awesome!  Plus, all the support vehicles were extravagant. Below are a whole bunch of photos of what we experienced, although you had to be there to hear the 'sound'!

The only downside to yesterday's trip to the St. Lawrence was that we didn't see any ships. Oh well, we will just have to go back! 

Forging Ahead: An Update

Wow, it has been almost a month since I posted last. Unfortunately, that is because we have had lots of rain and have been doing projects and "routine stuff" (as my mother used to called it). However, we had a great few days up in Ticonderoga with friends Arlyne and Charlie who live in Cape Coral and were visiting in their Airstream campervan. We road toured the area including the Champlain Bridge and the Fort St. Frederic ruins in the Crown Point Reservation, along with a boat ride out on Lake George in Moxie. Our highlight of their stay was our walk to see the beaver action on the upper LaChute River and we had more sightings than we have ever had before! One was so close that it gave us a big tail slap, alerting the rest of its kin to watch out. Arlyne and Charlie also got a tour of our Glenville property, but the rain set in again, so their time here was short. It was fantastic to get together again with them, as it had been more than 10 years since we had seen them and stayed at their dock in their canal when we were cruising on New Horizon.

This past week we finally had some nice hot weather and went back to Ticonderoga. We spent one day in Foxie on Lake Champlain, launching in Westport, and cruising north to Split Rock Point, then over to McNeil Cove, and Converse and Kingsland Bays in Vermont. We headed back south on the east side of the lake and into Basin Harbor before ending up near Button Island. The water was pretty weedy and turbid from the recent rain, so for old times' sake from our cruising days with our dachshund Scooter, we anchored off the little island we call the 'Button Hole'. It certainly was calm that day, but you can tell that storms were moving in. 

The following day we kayaked from Hague on Lake George, down to Arcady Bay, viewing all our favorite camps, boat houses, and wooden boats (photos can be seen in posts from previous years). It was a super hot day and we planned on swimming off one small island, but unbeknownst to us, gulls had nested on the island and we couldn't get near it as the parents were dive bombing us! Luckily, we found a sandy, shallow spot to take a quick dip to cool off, and then headed back to the house to turn on the a/c and do inside chores and a few upgrades. 

Friday was another scorcher of a day, but we had to get work done outside the house with tree trimming with the pole saw, along with mowing, weeding and bush trimming. We completely filled up our utility trailer with brush...more like overfilled it. 😉 Now we should be set for a long time (hopefully). We completed those projects just in time before a huge thunderstorm moved in. The lightning was amazing and one of our town beach lifeguards shot this photo...

Yesterday was a perfect day to take the Thunderbird to Old Forge for A.C.B.S.'s 31st Annual Fulton Chain Rendezvous. This is an antique and classic boat show held on the Fulton Chain of Lakes, starting from the protected 'Pond' into lakes 1 through 4. This was our first time for us, and we have decided that next year we will bring Flash to be on display and perhaps even spend a couple of nights there exploring this area in the Adirondacks. Below are some photos of the unique boats, including the start of the parade led by the local fireboat. 

We also met up with Mike Glenn, who is the president of our local antique outboard club. He represented the club with a few of his outboards and his Neiman Marcus plexiglass pram.

At 8:00 this morning we were out kayaking on Lake George again, before the boaters had a chance to 'wake' us. By 9 AM we were swimming off the north side of Anthony's Nose! We knew storms were predicted, so to beat the southbound weekend traffic we came back to Glenville early, arriving and settling in with 5 minutes to spare before the thunder started yet again. It may be rainy but things sure are green around here. We try to stay positive and do what we can when the weather allows. Like where we were yesterday, we are 'forging' ahead!