A-Bay to Oswego

Friday - August 14th.
Off the dock at 8:30 AM as planned, and a 55 mile run to Oswego. Sunny, warm and no wind....what more can you ask for?
As we pulled out of the marina basin, we got behind a freighter going down the St. Lawrence. We stayed behind the freighter for the next 25 miles until we got out onto Lake Ontario. About half way down the river, Doug took the lead. The river and lake were like glass, making for a very easy run to Oswego....or so we thought!

After rounding Cape Vincent and heading for Galloo Island, my port engine started acting up again. I noticed I was losing RPM's. Exactly the same symptom we experienced coming up this way. By the time we were about even with Main Duck Island, my port engine quit. Apparently the same dirty fuel filter causing the problem, but I had a spare on board and no need to worry. At this point we are about 25 miles offshore, but my starboard engine was running fine, and I figured we could run on one engine to Oswego. We slowed back down to 7 knots, and things were good for the next 5 miles or so. Then my port engine started doing the same....losing RPM's. But before she could quit, I slowed her down to 4 knots, radioed Doug to explain, and we were going to try to make the last 20 miles at this speed. Doug headed off into the horizon, keeping constant radio contact with me. Oswego has three very visable landmarks....two huge smokestacks from their electric power plant, and a huge plume of steam from their nuculear power plant called Nine Mile Point. All three were very visable from where we were, but they were also very slow into coming into clear range....however we made it about 15 mile further, and I tried starting the port engine. It started, and we were back to to 2 engines, although I kept them running slowly until we made it to the harbor entrance of Oswego.
As we entered the harbor, I thought it best to take on some new fuel, so I pulled into the Oswego Marina and took on a 100 gallons....just to be safe.
Doug had already stopped there and refueled himself, and he was already tied up at the west wall in Oswego.
After I fueled, I tied up in front of him and went on to change out the primary filters in both engines. Again, both were really dirty and it looked like oil instead of diesel fuel. I thanked God we made it to a safe harbor, and we settled into Oswego for the night.

We walked over to a restaurant called The Office for dinner.....had a great fish fry and returned back to the boat for a night's rest.
Doug and Donna headed back to the Clubhouse for a few beers, but Dottie and I were exhausted and went to bed.