The Erie Canal turns 200 years old this year, but with heavy rainfall delaying the waterway’s opening, some boaters are left adrift – not that they are too upset about it.
Matthew Bastian is a 62-year-old boater from Ontario, Canada. He and his wife, Judy Bastian, are returning home from the Bahamas through the Erie Canal.
The couple is using the canal as a shortcut. Or so they thought.
“The only other choice to get down south for us is to either go out the St. Lawrence River around Nova Scotia, down the coast of Maine, New York and so forth. So, by going through the Oswego and Erie Canals, for us, cuts out a huge portion of that trip,” he says.
But the Bastians have been docked on the side of the canal since Monday.
Heavy rainfall in April and May has caused minor infrastructure failures along parts of the canal that are delaying the historic passage’s full opening, according to New York State Canal Corporation Director Brian Stratton.
“We’re still closed in the Mohawk Valley section, but we hope that within in a couple of weeks people are going to be able to go through Buffalo,” he says.
Some boaters have docked their vessels outside of the canal’s Lock 2 as they wait for it to fully open.
Still, the delay due to wet weather hasn’t dampened the fanfare of this canal season’s bicentennial celebration.
State organizations like the New York State Canal Corporation, and the Albany Symphony are marking the canal’s bicentennial with free concerts and other events.
At a press conference in Waterford, where Clinton’s Ditch begins, Stratton said the bicentennial is a great opportunity to celebrate everything that New York state is.
“Amazing to think that this waterway, which really built our state and built our nation in many many ways has never stopped for 200 years the Erie Canal opened officially on October 26th, 1825 and almost 200 years later we’re still going strong,” he says.
The canal, a large factor in the economic development of New York state, stretches more than 360 miles from Albany to Buffalo.
Matthew Bastian, one of the stranded boaters, says his desire to journey through the canal has always been a dream.
“It’s always something I’ve known about as a kid, ya know, like young person, that this was a possibility and as the years went on and time and resources allowed for it, it became a kind of a reality that we could actually do this, so upon retirement, we readied the boat for a period of two years,” he says.
The retired engineer says he and his wife have known about the canal’s delayed opening for a couple weeks.
“In trying to deal with the water levels associated with that high water and the erosion of the banks, they were operating the locks and dams in conditions they don’t normally, and they ended up causing secondary damage to the locks, so those are now currently under repair, it is our understanding that the repairs are going very well,” he says.
Although the pair is stuck for now, they say the trip has been a great experience.
“We came because we wanted to see all these wonderful places, experience all these things, but what we really discovered on the way, that it’s really about the people, and the people you meet along the way and the friendships you make,” he says.
There’s more information about bicentennial celebration events at wamc.org.
