THE GREAT LAKES

[Ivan Cloherty]

.......I know Ivan is going to say did the Topaz have to clean the lakes as well.....

Eh! John lad, getting to know me too well, now stealing my thunder(box)

[Paul Racine]

John
I was going to send you a link to the handbook but I can't figure out how to do it. Anyway, if you Google "The Seaway Handbook" you will find it and can check out its contents which are very comprehensive. I live very close to one of the seaway locks and this spring when it reopens I will check out if seamen are still using the jumping booms. ( I'll let you know) In all my recent visits to the locks I have not seen a ship tie up to let another through. Perhaps just bad timing or just reduced volume of traffic.
Cheers
Paul

LINK: THE SEAWAY HANDBOOK

[leratty]

Deepsea reckon that comment re Boltons & narrow beam must have been the case with the Beaver boats as they too rolled like hell crossing either way. In fact we called it on the Beaver Ash like being in a Bendex washing machine as we had to keeps the ports bolted down if you did not you would regret it when returning to your cabin as when rolling they would be covered in green water. first time you saw a little scary, first time your cabin was flooded you never forgot to bolt the ports either.

[DeepSea]

Regarding the boom jumping. As I was only Deck Boy and OS, I was designated as one to go over the side and run aft to do the stern line. Number of occasions when running back I could not get to the jacobs ladder in time and had to walk up to the lock and climb onboard as the ship came to the level of the quay.

[Kevin Mercer]

Spent five years running up the lakes with Manchester Liners and had a great time. Did all the ports and always got out before December 15th ( I think ) and the big freeze, otherwise the ship was stuck there and most of the crew flown home till the spring.
We left it late one year and came down the river sideways in pack ice dangerously close to Quebec bridge: I could have counted the rivets !!
The Montreal dockers hated the British, always nasty to us, a real unpleasant bunch. I watched them one trip unloading Rolls Royce cars and the 2nd mate told me they dropped the cars when it got to the the last six feet or so hoping to damage them "accidentally"
In the old days there was a temporary rail line across the river from near Quebec to the other side on the ice it was that thick. A bit like the ICE ROAD TRUCKERS.
Man Liner's ships were only small in order to get up the Manr. ship canal, 7,000 tonnes average, so we got some pretty hairy North Atlantic passages.
Seems like yesterday
Kevin

[j.sabourn]

Anyone of a younger age reading some of this will say to themselves whats the problem. With some of todays shipping I personally would not have to tie up to the approach walls as could hold ship there on thrusters and fancy becker rudders etc. In the likes of a 35000 ddwt ship trying to get alongside without tugs, one had usually one run at it, any offshore wind and the ship was like a huge sail, so was imperative to get men ashore soonest. Most people think a ship is driven like a motor car, in the days of a fixed single propellor and single plate rudder, ship handling was a different ball game than what it is today especially to those who have only sailed on the more modern tonnage. Cheers John Sabourn

[Ivan Cloherty]

Your post #36 John, now ain't that the truth, also a difference between steam ships and motor ships in manouvering response. The steam ships with their big propellers and slow revs made you think well ahead for any manouver(s)

[Trader]

I have been reading this thread with interest as I spent many years between 1956 to 1965 running to the Great Lakes with Manchester Liners. My first trips in 1956 were on the Manchester Vanguard three years before the Seaway opened, she was specially built to operate on the old original seaway and so she was only 258 feet long to fit in the old locks which were about 260/265 feet long and 43 feet wide with depth of 14 feet. Her tonnage was 1661 Gross, 703 Nett. so quite small for the Atlantic crossing.

There were 6 canals and 21 locks to pass through from Montreal to Lake Ontario so you were on the go night and day swinging ashore, tying up and letting go, as some one earlier in the thread said there was plenty of overtime. I think it is down to 7 locks now on the new Seaway, quite a difference from 21. On some of the canals if the distance between locks was small we would walk along the canal rather than climb back aboard and boom out again. On our booms we just had a knotted rope which we slid down when over the quay, had some scary moments sometimes but that is for another thread.

This thread started with a question about bad weather on the Lakes, I can't say we experienced a lot but we did have some heavy weather on Lake Michigan on the way down to Chicago sometimes especially getting towards the end of the season but we were a small ship and a bigger one wouldn't have noticed it.. On the
whole it was an enjoyable and interesting run, short trips of about 2 months Manchester back to Manchester. We did all the ports such as Toronto, Hamilton, Buffalo, Toledo, Detroit, Sarnia, Chicago, Milwaukee and a few other small ports.

As the draft was only 14 feet on the old canals we would top up at Montreal, Three Rivers or Quebec to get to our maximum draft.

I have put a few thumbnails on hope they come out OK,

Alec Sheldon.Manchester Vanguard Soulange Canal 1957 l.jpgManchester Vanguard on the lock gates.jpgGreasers Smoko,leaving locks Soulange canal,Manchester Vanguard 1957.jpgVanguard in ice.jpg

They show how tight it was in the locks. One of them is of Greasers having smoko leaving a
lock on the Soulange canal and the last one is after she had changed colours a couple of years later stuck in the ice shortly after leaving Montreal to top up at Three Rivers.

PS. The advantage of sailing on this little ship was that in the winter she was on charter to Yeowards of Liverpool on the Canary Island run (Las Palmas, Tenerife and La Palma) carrying seed potatoes and general
out via Lisbon and tomatoes, bananas and new potatatoes home. A lovely little run.

[Tony Wilding]

i was on her when owned by General Steam Navigation Co, as MV Shelldrake, an extremely noisy Engine Room. Rolls Royce Generators. YUK.!

[leratty]

Deep Sea,
I did that too, must say it was both scary as well as exciting. The worst I reckon was getting back on board which you mention as she moved out of the lock. God knows why one of us boy sailors was not killed or injured, particularly as generally we were the smallest on board. The beauty of the Gt Lakes will stay with me forever, spectacular is all I can say. When I left the sea & completed university in my career I worked for a large gas & oil Co based in Calgary, man that put me off Canada as the cold was beyond belief! They were bemused when I said I was resigning to get away from the weather as the job I had risen to with them was a very very good one with serious prospects but man that cold.

Kevin post 35; I must have been naive as I never even though we were there during the Canadian flag changing time had nor heard any nastiness from the Montreal or French Canadians. On the contrary we made quite a few friends both there & down river. I reckon as I was but a lad these things were not noticeable to us, maybe? Apropos the Roller that would have been the case in Aus too for sure as quite a few rectal passages in the wharfees community. Richard