July 28
What an exciting and crazy day! We left Hastings around 8:45 headed to the famous Peterborough Lift Lock. More on that later.
Below is the lock door in Hastings. Notice the doors are made of 13″ X 13″ X 21′ long timbers.
Right next to where Whisky Business was tied up were spare timbers for the doors. Notice the rail tracks? I am guessing these really heavy timbers are placed on a tracked vehicle and rolled over to the lock which was immediately behind our boat.
Very picturesque day. Check ’em out.
Maybe a big blue alien spacecraft???
Narrow channels and lots of very shallow areas required constant vigilance. Not really stressful but our attention could not waver.
A lot of No Wake signs which required slow running. Lots of cottages along the water that kept our speed at around 6 MPH. If you wake one of these cottages with their boats, residents will call the next lock and the lock attendants will hold you there till the police arrive. A boater is responsible for any damage their wake causes.
Two buddy boats we are traveling with.
The majority of the waterway is lined with cottages and their attendant boats. Better not wake ’em.
So here’s where our day got really interesting and challenging. We entered the 18th lock at Scotts Mills. These locks are quite small, only 2 boats the size of WB will fit in one of these locks. Nothing like the huge locks you see on the inland rivers of the US. While we are waiting for the lock doors to open along side comes this tour boat. We are set up for a starboard (right) side tie when one of the lock hands comes and tells us the tour boat ALWAYS ties up on the starboard. Now Debbie has to move a fender to the other side of the boat and now we are tying up on the port (left) side of the wall and the wind is blowing the back of WB towards this tour boat full of tourists. Had we tied up on the starboard side of the lock the wind would have held us there and we would have had no problem. That tour boat is a big sail so that is why he always takes that side of the chamber. We never touched him but it was really tight.
Next lock is Number 19 at Peterborough, the worlds highest LIFT lock in the world. This is a 65′ vertical lift lock built in 1904. The engineer who designed and oversaw the construction was a guy named Rogers. Who knew???
Following are a number of videos and photos of this amazing feat of engineering.
Our departure from Scotts Mills lock and approach half a mile later at the Peterborough Lift Lock.
Our “lift” to the top.
Our arrival 65 feet later!
Some more photos of the lock. One of the two locking “pans” in the raised position.
Another angle of the same pan.
Our boats at the top tied up to the wall.
The tour boat we shared locks with in the lower pan.
This is how it works. Took a picture, too lazy to re-type it.
Once we get to the top and WB is secured to the wall, Deb and I get to take turns operating the lift lock.
This is how Debbie did it:
This is how I did it. The lock attendant really screwed up by giving me the microphone…
THEY LOVE US HERE!!!!
Went to this spot for dinner. Quite good.
Couple sitting to my right are Cindy and Todd, owners of My Old Beauty, an extremely well cared for 30 year old Symbol motor yacht. They are from Ontario and are thinking about cruising the Great Loop. We even met a couple on a boat called Mo Whisky from New Zealand. Remarkable that people literally from the other side of the world come here to do this. 
Saltaire tied up at the top.
These are the stairs we had to climb to get to the top of the lock.
Took these photos after dinner.
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