A Decade Under The Influence

 What can I remember…

Yesterday got out of work

Came home

Went to dinner

Headed up to Syracuse.  thought I had the GPS more or less figured out, tell it to take the short route to get up north, then setting it to quick to get on I90.  Except that it never went on 90…  I realized as we were just about to Syracuse that was because I had left Avoid Toll roads turned on.  Oops.  Oh well, no big deal, just a bit longer to get there.  It was after 9:30 when we got to the Microtel.  Never stayed at one of those before.  Nice place.  Small, but more efficiently laid out.

Today…  Yep, we’ve been legally married for 10 years…  The weather was nicer today.  (:

Got up, got cleaned up, called to check on the boat schedules for the lock in Massena, realized that it was 11:30, 11:45 or not until 3:30.  So we had some breakfast and headed out as there wasn’t a lot of time to spare.  Did well till we got to Watertown and the two lane we were quite familiar with for a few years, but haven’t driven it maybe more than 3 times in the last decade+  Unfortunately we got stuck behind a couple slow people for maybe 30 miles.  This is THE main thoroughfare in the area, not really any other way to get around, it’s a two lane 55mph road and this guy was averaging around 49mph, and then we’d hit a 30mph town and he’d go 20mph.  Quite frustrating when you don’t have a lot of time to spare.  Luckily I FINALLY found a place to pass with a good bit of distance before the oncoming car would hit us, the Prius happily zipped up to around 85mph and we made it on past.

And in the end we made it just about perfectly timed, however the visitor center was closed as we knew, and we got to the parking lot that was supposed to be open only to find that it was in the middle of being paved.  Like the whole thing…  So we pulled up and asked the guy and said it was just going to be a while, we just picked about the worst time to get there, and I thought, well I didn’t pick what time the ship would be arriving…  So we asked if we could walk up and he said that was fine.

So we walked on up and sure enough there is this big ol’ freighter slowly meandering in towards the lock.  After a while, he starts pulling in.  apparently they are 80′ wide and have 12" to spare on either side.  But he got in, and then sure enough he disappears almost entire into the lock as he’s lowered down to the height closer to the ocean side of things, and then pulls out the other side.  Very cool and definitely worth watching.  There was another ship up on the way, but it was about an hour for the first one, so we figured we’d seen enough with that one.

We wandered up through the state park area and found the FDR Hydro power plant visitor’s center.  That’s what I consider a cool museum.  Almost every exhibit has something to do with technology and most of them are hands on demonstrations of electricity and what not.

Then we headed back out and went to Sara’s favorite sub place which seems to only exist in the North Country, Jreck Subs, followed by DQ which is also rare around our home.

Then we headed on down here to our hotel, stopping at a few of the parking areas to read signs about the area and look out over the Seaway and thousand islands.

So this hotel is kinda interesting…  It’s definitely off the beaten path…  Kinda somewhere between a B&B and Motel…  Only 14 rooms and the "office"(there is a sign) is basically the door to the guy’s house/living room, and the "coffee shop" we have yet to visit, but appears to be his back door.  And this is basically in a residential neighborhood, though we are out on a point with a nice lawn and decks into the seaway.  Sooo…  different, but I think pretty nice…

We had dinner on a floating barge restaurant.  Didn’t notice it till the end when I thought I felt myself moving a bit.  Good chicken parm.

And then we’ve just been sitting out on a swing on the dock by the water.